Against the Odds
by Valentin Laboy
Summary: An AU of the Hunger Games, where Gale and Katniss have a relationship prior to the 74th HG reaping. How will history have turned out if Gale and Katniss had been the tributes, rather than Peeta and Katniss. Galeniss lemons scattered throughout. As told by Gale.
1. The Sins of My Father

**This is my first fanfic of all time. It may be my only one as well. I've always loved the Hunger Games, but I always thought Gale was the better match for Katniss. If you guys really like this, I may extend the story into all three books. Heads up, most of the details in this fanfic come from the films, such as character descriptions. Gale is 18, Katniss is 16. May the odds be ever in their favor. Some chapters will largely be flashbacks, but there will only be two of those.**

 **Disclaimer: I own NOTHING, NADA, ZILCH. All is of Suzanne Collins.**

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 **The Sins of my Father**

"Primrose Everdeen."

No. That didn't just happen. She did not just call that name, there must be some kind of mistake. Her name is only in there once, one fucking time, and yet she's the one who was just reaped. I finally come to realize that there's no mistake about it, twelve-year-old Prim is being reaped for the death games. And then I see her emerge from the crowd, Katniss Everdeen, the only girl I ever loved. I know what she's about to do, and I can't do anything about it.

"I volunteer! I volunteer as tribute!" She yells. Effie's face is the definition of joyful surprise. The next thing I hear are Prim's pained cries, as Catnip tries to console her for what's happening. I impulsively move to help, and I pick up little Prim and carry her to her mother. She looks paralyzed, similar to what Katniss told me about her after the mining explosion. She seems to come to once I get there with Prim, but still nothing is gonna help her go through the soon-to-be loss of her daughter. As I finally return through the aisle to my area in the crowd, Effie asks for Katniss's name. She barely mumbles it into the microphone, and it surprises me that she was even able to say anything.

Effie asks in her rather annoying Capitol accent, "Well I bet my hat that was your sister, wasn't it?" A question Katniss answers in the affirmative. "Let's have a big round of applause for District 12's very first volunteer." Silence. More silence. Nobody gives any clapping, or any gesture of congratulations. Instead, we all give our highest honor possible, kissing our three middle fingers together on one hand and raising them to her. Unlike the Capitol and the wealthy districts, we find no honor in participating in the monstrous event punishing us for sins of our fathers and grandfathers. I sure as hell don't. "And now, for the boys." Effie's voice snaps me out of my thoughts. Great, now we get to find out the unfortunate male soul that will head off to the games. The name we hear has everyone starting to cry, "Gale Hawthorne." Unlike Prim, no one will volunteer for me, but I don't want them too.

As I walk through the wide aisle, all I can hear and see is Katniss sobbing uncontrollably, realizing that regardless, she's losing someone dear to her heart. I'm just grateful it isn't her innocent sister. When I finally get up the stairs where Effie's waiting, the first thing I do is wrap myself around her, her doing the same, both of us with tears running down our faces. Out of the corner of my eye, even Effie seems rather touched by what she sees. And then she bids the iconic last sentence, "Happy Hunger Games! And may the odds be ever in your favor. Shake hands…" The way she says the last two words make it obvious that she knows that won't happen. That we won't accept one another as competitors. Rather, I turn Katniss to look at me, and I lower my lips to hers in a heated and passionate kiss.

Goes to figure that the aptly named peacekeepers have no scruples tearing us from one another and dragging us into the Justice Building. I've never had the trouble of coming in here before. The room they toss me in is a slight testament to the luxury of the Capitol. Enough "snacks" to feed my family and Katniss' for multiple months on end, furniture that could fit Vick, Posy, and Rory considered small pieces. Dark colored curtains shading the light from outside, I kind of have to wonder if they're colored black specifically for the district's industry. The chandelier above emits more light into the room alone than most of the district during what can be considered a relatively nice day. All of this luxury contrasts the terrible reason I'm in here, and the contrast makes me even sicker than I already am.

Not even a minute after the door closes it opens again, this time letting my mother and my little siblings in. "You have three minutes," warns one of the peacekeepers. Before the peacekeeper finishes his warning, we're all in a somber embrace, and embrace of grief and tears. If I'm going to show any kind of sadness and grief, now's the last time I can. If I show any of this on camera, it'll scream weakness to everyone.

"Gale, I…Gale, I'm so sorry," my mother barely can even say through her infinite sobbing. Vick and Rory can't even say anything through their cries.

I barely can make out Rory trying to tell me he loves me, which I answer with another hug, and respond that I love him too, and I do the same with Vick. However, when Posy jumps into my arms, she's crying out, "Please don't leave!" It takes every ounce of energy and willpower I can muster not to start bawling myself, at hearing this.

When I finally return to my mother, she's a little more collected. She finally manages croak, "take care of yourself, and her. We'll help with Katniss's family." When I hear this, I feel some comfort, knowing that Prim and her mother won't suffer through this alone.

"Vick, Rory, Posy. I love you all more than I can hope to ever say. You guys have to be as strong as you can for mom. Rory. Whatever happens, don't apply for tesserae. It's not worth putting your name in more times." That was all I could get out before the peacekeepers came and took them from me. And Posy from my arms. I could barely keep from sobbing again when Posy called out to me again. Once again calling me dad.

As I stand there crying again once the door blocks Posy's voice, the door opens again. This time, for Prim and Mrs. Everdeen, and I give them the same somber embrace I did my own family. "They won't starve. I promise." I hear Mrs. Everdeen. I turn to her and give her a slight smile, one she reciprocates back.

I turn to Prim and tell her the same thing I told Rory, not to take tesserae. "I know, Katniss told me that same thing."

I tell the both of them, "my family will help you in any manner they can."

Prim then tells me some of the most surprising news, which considering the circumstances is quite something. "The Mellarks told us that they will try to keep us from starving, your family too." The moment I hear this, I feel slight relief, but at the same time, part of me wonders why they would help us. All we've ever really done is trade, no relationship worth such an assistance. The Mellarks owe us nothing.

All I do for what feels like forever is hold little Prim in my arms. Right before the peacekeepers take her and her mother from the room, I whisper to Prim, "I'll keep her safe. I promise you, she will come home to you, both of you."

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 _P.S. : my chapter titles contain a lyric from various songs. If you can guess the right song in the reviews, I'll give you a little shoutout in the author's note in the next chapter. Try and guess this one._


	2. All Night Long

**Author's Note: I lied when I said there would be two flashback chapters. This is the only one, and it's the one detailing Gale and Katniss's shared history up until the reaping. After this, everything goes forward, any flashbacks will be within a forward-moving chapter.**

 **Reminder, the titles are taken directly from songs. From this chapter onward, the bottom of the page will give a hint. Sometimes I will use lyrics from songs I used before. Guess the correct songs, get a shoutout next chapter. The hint for chapter 1's song will down there too. SO MAKE SURE YOU READ THE ITALICIZED WORDS AT THE BOTTOM. Friendly reminder, this is based on the films.**

 **P.S.: I currently have no schedule set in mind right now, updates will be sporadic, but very likely no more than a 2-week wait.**

 **Disclaimer: I own nothing.**

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 **All Night Long**

Katniss and I officially met under...dark circumstances four years ago. An explosion deep within the mines took the lives of our fathers. Had I not been reaped, I would've been going down those same mines, 12 hours a day in the most grueling conditions in all of Panem. When I went to the mines while survivors were emerging, she was there too. Fewer and fewer people came out, until no more came out, and our fathers were not among them. It ended our lives as we knew it. Life in the Seam was never easy, but the presence of our families made for some comfort. The loss of our fathers ended that, destroying the unit that gave us some semblance of happiness. Fittingly enough, we also adopted the role of caretaker, since I was the only aged male in the house, and Catnip had to take charge of her house with her mother's catatonia.

I met Katniss again in the forest outside the district, when I was 14 and she she was 12. I caught her examining a snare that had a rabbit in messed with her a bit, saying, "You know hunting out here is illegal?" Her first reaction was to aim a bow-strung arrow at me.

She truthfully told me, "It's not mine, I just found it out here."

"I know you just found it, because it's mine."

She responded with a slight chuckle, and lowered her bow a bit, and asked me how I made the snare. I answered her question with my own, "What's your name?" I didn't ask her the first time I saw her. She responded with a whisper, and I thought she said Catnip, which I found hilarious, hence the nickname that I have for her today. We started teaching each other the arts of archery, from her to me, and trap-setting, me to her. She was the best archer I ever met, and she told me she never met anyone so good at setting such efficient and inconspicuous traps. I never thought myself that way, but she did and still does.

For 3 and a half years, that was the relationship we had. We were always going out in the woods, and we found a spot where the first one would wait for the other, would check older snares, and see if there was anything we could shoot. Then we would go to the Hob and see what we could trade for what we caught. Sometimes we would stop by the Mellarks' bakery for some bread. It saved my family from complete starvation, and actually kept us quite well-fed. One night after his passing, all four of us made a promise that Posy would be the priority of the family, that she would be the first one to eat what she needed. Ever since then, anything edible I brought was first given to her until she had been satisfied, and the rest was split among Mom, Vick, and Rory, since I normally at whatever I trapped immediately after getting it. Katniss told me she would do a similar thing with Prim, making sure she was fed before herself and her mother. This had a kind of revitalization effect on Prim, as she appeared much more full in her frame, rather than emaciated as she had before. Before, she barely weighed 70 lbs wet. In Posy, she grew in a manner that I never saw Vick or Rory when they were growing up. This applied to myself according to my mom.

* * *

After my penultimate reaping when I was 17, I realized that something in my feelings for her had changed. It was so slow I barely noticed. I would find myself looking at her for long periods for reasons I didn't even know. Sometimes, I would even catch her doing the same, and sometimes I would pretend not to notice. As I pondered on my feelings, I realized that I wanted to be more than a friend to Katniss, and I knew it was wrong, because I looked and even felt so much older than she was. Eventually, Mom caught me staring at Catnip in the Hob a little after the end of the 73rd games.

"You know, nothing's gonna happen if you guys just keep staring at each other," she said.

She caught me off guard, all I could sheepishly say was "What?"

"You and Everdeen's daughter. Nothing will happen between the two of you if you just stare at her."

"There's nothing between us. We're just friends mom."

"That's my point, there won't be anything between you two unless you do something about what you clearly feel for her. You know Mr. Mellark pretty well, don't you?"

"Um, yes. But what does that have to do with any of this? With me or Katniss?"

"When he and I were young, he fell in love with a woman from a distance, a woman who worked at an apothecary. But he never acted on what he felt for multiple years, and guess what happened?"

"What, she ran off with someone else?"

"Not just anyone, a coal miner from the Seam, and she moved there, and left behind everything to be with him."

Is she being serious right now? "Stupid woman marrying a coal miner, and giving up the most comfortable life you can have in this district," I scoff. I can't believe that a woman, or rather anybody would do that, but I guess that means she is a good person, or at least truly loved him.

"A coal miner, with a gorgeous talent for singing."

When she says that, I feel a sense of familiarity in the description.

"And that _stupid woman_ , has a brilliant talent for healing, something her youngest child inherited from her. But she lost her vitality and her ability to do anything after she lost him."

No, that woman couldn't be, could it? It had to be a coincidence, because that sounded a lot like Katniss's mother. It made sense though, because Mrs. Everdeen really loved her husband, maybe even too much. So much that fell into almost a coma after Mr. Everdeen's death, along in the mines. I looked at her incredulously, at which point she started giggling a little.

With a smile on her face, she articulated and confirmed my thought, saying, "That's right, the woman that Mr. Mellark never confessed his feelings to, was Mrs. Everdeen. Now, I don't know about you, but I'd rather history not repeat itself with the women in that family."

She played the mistake of history card. She's definitely right about what could happen, but she's wrong because she told me time and time again that she never wanted to fall in love, because love is weakness, and even more so, she never even wants kids. And that's kind of what I wanted in life at some point. I told her this.

She responded, "As a woman, I know what it's like to feel like that. Especially at that age. I even felt that way myself at one point. But as you can tell, I changed my mind, about children. Falling in love is something wholly different, you can't choose. It just happens. Also as a woman, the way she's been staring at you for this entire conversation makes it obvious to me that she feels the same about you as you do her. Which is also why your age difference makes no difference. Speak to her about it, or later you may regret. You don't regret what you do, you regret what you fail to do."

Once again she articulated my thought of me and Katniss's respective ages. But I realized that she was right in all aspects. And when I did glance at Katniss, I realized that she had been staring at me, evident in her miserable attempt to pass it off as if she was in the middle of turning around to go to Greasy Sae's table. I decided right there that I would follow my mother's advice, and chose to tell her what I felt for her the next time we went hunting. Except that I never did. I never grew a pair and told her what I felt for her. But little did I know, I wouldn't need to.

* * *

On one particular day, when me and Katniss were on our way to the woods about a month after the 73rd games, this girl came running up to us, calling my name. I recognized her from school but I didn't know who she was. I initially thought she was from the Seam, like me and a Katniss, since she had the same complexion most of the residents who live there do. However, the fact that she seems rather clean, with some light streaks in her hair, she was probably from one of the businesses closer to the more affluent part of the district.

"Hi Gale," she said, with an overtly flirtatious tone. What did she not see Catnip right here with me?

"Uh, do I know you?"

She gasps, though her body makes it obvious she doesn't actually care that I don't remember her, "Gale, it's me Lidia. We've gone to school together for like, our whole lives."

"Doesn't exactly ring any bells." Okay, she definitely knows she's here, but is completely disregarding Katniss. "What do you want?"

"Well, me and some of my friends are having a little celebration, it's for the kids whose last reaping was their final one. It may be for 18-year-olds like myself, but you would definitely qualify. I was hoping you would come and have some... _fun_ with us."

This girl was seriously idiotic if she couldn't tell that my eyes were drawn to Katniss. In a tone as sarcastic as possible, I said to her, "So sorry, but I'm already busy at the moment."

The look on Lidia's face betrayed her feeling of defeat. "With…her?"

"Yes, with...Katniss."

The pouting and overly childish angry look she shot at Katniss made me laugh hysterically on the inside. "Fine. But if you want to actually have a good time, you know where to find us."

Yeah, whatever. Like that would ever happen. "Yeah, sure thing." When I turned back to look at Katniss, I saw a highly mixed face, that quickly turned to obvious anger. I wasn't certain, but I'm fairly sure that she's actually jealous right now. I still ask, "Catnip. What's up with you?"

Her response was to simply walk ahead of until we reached the fence marking the end of the district.

Out of nowhere when we were in the middle of the forest, Katniss screamed at me, "Who was she?"

Dumbfounded, I responded, "No one, couldn't you tell?"

"Yeah, I could tell that. But still. Even if she was a nobody to you, she implied that other girls weren't nobodies to you."

Oh, that was what was eating at her. Oh yeah, she was definitely jealous. I say in a rather coy voice, "Getting a little bit jealous there Katniss?"

She opens her mouth as if she wanted to deny it, but she stops before any sound escapes her mouth. After a small war with herself, she actually relented to the truth, "Yes."

I expected her to take it back a second later, but I hoped that she wouldn't. But to my delight, she didn't. The look on her face made it clear that my mom was right as she always is. For three years I had been with this girl, slowly becoming close to her, opening myself to her. She began to do the same for me. As time went by, we were close enough to read each other's faces and pretty much have a conversation with no words. I realized just how much I loved her, especially whenever I would touch her. It would feel like my body was sprung to life, I never felt more alive than I did when I was with Katniss Everdeen. I knew that I wanted this now, no more excuses, no more masks, no more denying it.

Catnip had been watching me quite closely, and could easily see my elation at her failure to deny what she said. The smile on her face made it clear that her walls were tumbling down, completely shattering. She began tracing her hand up the thin shirt I was wearing, clenching her hands into my chest, clearly enjoying their muscular feel. One of her hands reached past my collarbone and to the base of my neck.

My own hands weren't idle, I was tracing the curves of her hips until I reached the small of her back. One of my hands impulsively went to her neck of its own volition. And then sparks fly between us as our lips collide in a perfect passionate storm.

My arms wrapped around her waist, lifting her up to me as her hands scratched my scalp, feeling through my hair. I pulled at and took out her braid and let her gorgeous dark hair fall to her waist, and I ran my fingers through the curtain that formed because of it. Her mouth opened to me, and I kissed her forcefully and with a hunger to taste her further. But before the flying sparks turned to complete fire, she retreated slightly, leaving my mouth enough to say, "Not too fast."

I fully understood, and even I could empathize with her as we were each other's first time. I nodded in response, and then our lips met again. This time my back met the soft grass in the small clearing we were in. We kissed for what felt like forever, until we noticed that the sun had gone quite distant through the sky. When we finally had enough sanity to break apart, we realized that we needed to tell our families about the new development in our relationship. As it turned out, Prim had been made aware by Rory. In fact most of the school knew of our friendship and had been placing bets on when our friendship would evolve into something more. Whoever bet on us, won the bets they placed.

* * *

On Katniss's 16th birthday, I spent a large portion of the day trying to find something for her in the Hob. I found something from Greasy Sae, it was a gold-colored pin, a little dirty. It was a bird with its head turned toward the back with what looked like an arrow in its beak. She told me it was a mockingjay. She gave it to me, for free. I was so touched by the gesture. When I went out into the woods looking for her, she found me and gestured for me to come with her. She brought me to a small clearing, the one where we first kissed. There was a blanket laid out, with a small fire and some game she hunted for.

"A picnic, Catnip?"

"What, you would rather eat in one of our houses?"

I chuckled a little at that and shook my head. "Hey, I got you something." I pulled out the mockingjay pin.

She looked at it in disbelief, "How much did you have to pay for this?"

I looked at her and she couldn't believe that I managed to get this. The look I gave her made it clear that I didn't lose anything for it. Her disbelief obviously grew from realizing that. "So what are we having to eat?"

"Well, I caught three squirrels and a rabbit. We can go see if your snares got anything."

"Even with everything, that's not much of a full meal even for Prim or Posy."

She looked at me smiling and chuckled through her breath, saying, "You didn't ask me what our main course is."

"Okay, what is our main course?"

She responded by lightly kissing me. I didn't understand what she was trying to indicate, until she started to take off her jacket, and then it was becoming obvious.

"I hoped it would be you," she said rather lasciviously.

I try to resist her, and said, "Catnip, are you-"

She stopped me before I could say anything else. "The reaping is only about a month away. I don't know what could happen. You and I have applied for tesserae so many times. I don't want to wait any longer."

With that, any and all resistance shattered as we began to kiss, in a slow and sensual tongue tango, as my hand reached and ran through her loose, long, soft hair. We moved until she was below me, on her back on the blanket she laid out. Her arms moved to my shirt, her fingers scratching through my shirt, massaging the muscles in my chest, earning her a groan from me. Her hands went to my back and slid under my shirt. I broke our kissing long enough for it to slip off, discarded. I respond by slowly lifting of her shirt, leaving her with solely her black bra. I then took the initiative to remove her shoes and pants, and placed my hand and pressed where she was already wet, and obviously ready for me. I kicked off the shoes I was wearing and she then undid and removed the pants I was wearing. She reached into my boxers and grabbed me, finding me already hard and yearning for her body. She then removed my boxers, exposing me to her. She clearly reveled in the sight of me bare before her. Her breathing and my own were so sporadic and labored, we knew that there was no way to go back. I then removed her last remaining garments, exposing herself to me, and I reveled in the full sight of her. She was, and still is, so gorgeous. She grabbed me yet again and pulled me to her warm wet entrance.

"You ready, Catnip?"

She nodded. And then I pushed forward inside of her. I stopped, because she felt so tight, and I could see the tears she was holding back come out, I knew it probably was gonna hurt her. I was feeling something new myself, not really pain but something intense. When she told me ok, I began to move inside her, moving my mouth to her neck, kissing and lightly running my teeth down it. She responded by scratching down my sweaty back, branding me as her own. Her moans made it clear that whatever pain she felt had melted into pleasure. I kept feeling her clench around me at accelerating intervals, she even begged me to move faster, which I did. Our moans and gasps could be as loud as we wanted since we were out in the forest. She forcefully scratched down my entire back, making it very red. Eventually I felt her spasm and compress around me, far stronger than before, and it forced me to come, too, as we absorbed each other's screams in a forceful kiss. We lay on the blanket for a minute, me softening inside her, until we moved, with me on my back and her head on the spot between my shoulder and chest, still catching our breath.

Katniss whispered, "Gale?"

"Yeah, Catnip?"

"We should've done that the first time we kissed here."

We had a little laugh at that, before falling asleep, waking up well into the night, still naked. Catnip was looking at me as I awakened, clearly having been awake for a long time.

"You know, Catnip, I don't think our mothers will be very keen on us being out here for so long. We should get back."

She looked at me, and said, "I know, can't we just stay here for a bit longer."

I should've said no, because a bit longer turned into all night long.

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 _Hint for previous chapter: Ed Sheeran_

 _Hint for this chapter: Selena Gomez_


	3. Against It All

**A/N: chapter 1 title comes from Ed Sheeran's _Makes It Rain_**

 **Chapter 2 title comes from Selena Gomez's _Slow Down_**

 **No more little games, just basing my titles after songs. If you want me to use a particular song, let me know in reviews.**

 **Disclaimer: I own absolutely nothing**

* * *

 **Against it** **All**

After flashing through my life with Katniss, I'm sprung back to reality by the feeling of arms pulling me to my feet. I finally realize that Effie is trying to get my attention.

She asks me, "Are you alright?" I can't even begin to fathom why she thinks any of this is okay.

I scornfully respond, "What do you think?"

I follow her with a few peacekeepers outside where they escort us to the car, where I see Katniss already waiting. They said it would be around 5 minutes, but it feels like forever. I'm more concerned with Katniss, as she doesn't seem to be faring well. "You okay Catnip?"

She simply looks at me, and I can easily tell that she isn't. She pulls my arm around her shoulders, and relaxes into me. I pull her into an embrace with my other arm, and I can feel that her breathing is labored, she's resisting the urge to cry.

"Prim told me the Mellarks will help our families."

"I didn't know that we meant so much to them."

"Well, Mr. Mellark did always love your mother."

She pulls away enough to look at me, but when she does, it's a look of surprise. I couldn't tell if she was surprised that I knew, or that Mr. Mellark loved her mother, but I don't ask. And she doesn't say anything, she just goes back to relaxing into me. Her breathing seems to have become less labored.

Effie begins talking yet again annoyingly and joyfully in her accent. "You two are in for a real treat big beds with silk-lined sheets, giant showers that will make you sparkle when you use them…"

The rest of what she's saying is lost into my thoughts, thoughts I'm certain that Katniss is having too, given that we're practically one in the same in our thinking. I think about what the arena will be like, I hope that a part of it is a forest, because that is our strong suit. But even if the arena is mostly forest, it won't be like the one we're used to. In the arena, we will have 22 people trying to kill us, mutts that the Capitol will release to hunt us, then we have to face the dangers already in place in the arena, unnatural threats designed to make our deaths painful for us and spectacular for the Capitol audience. All of this being said, I'm seriously betting the odds against us. But we're far stronger than a lot of the tributes from 12 typically are, so one of us may actually have a shot at winning. Once again the reality sinks in, one of us. Only one person can walk out of that arena, either I'm gonna lose Katniss, or she's gonna lose me, assuming that either of us make to the end.

All these thoughts keep echoing in my brain, until Katniss, lifts herself from me and shakes me from my thoughts, the look in her face confirms my earlier belief that she was thinking of the same things I was. She wraps her arm around my neck and pulls my lips to hers, in a soft kiss with a strong flame of passion. As we did on the stage, we affirm that we are not one another's competitors, we are closer than any kind of ally or friend. We are one entity in all but appearance. I am the half that completes her, as she does me. It also begins to give me a charge we haven't felt since our first time back in the forest again.

We get so caught up in the moment we fail to realize that the car has stopped, only realizing it when Effie pulls at Katniss's hand. If she had any kind of reaction to the display we gave her, we either missed it, or she's very good at hiding it behind her grin. She gestures for us to leave, but we need a moment to collect ourselves a bit. Especially me. When we finally are able to walk around without seeming awkward, Effie guides us to the train station that looks as decrepit as the rest of the district.

"Oh! This is just wonderful, everyone is going to adore you two," Effie says practically squealing in glee, driving me to the brink of my sanity. "The star-crossed lovers of district 12 is a story that they are just going to love! You two were born to be stars! And the best part is that you two make yourselves presentable naturally, all I have to do is touch you up a bit, and you will be the Capitol darlings."

Katniss probably knew that in my uncontrollable temper, I would want to clock her across the face, since she firmly gripped my across my body. It's all I can do not to punch her for making this grim situation sound so harmless and causal. However, being fair, that's the nature born from being raised in the Capitol.

Finally alone on the train, Effie's gleeful visage finally melts away into a straight face when she sees the way I'm glaring at her. I decide that I'm not gonna hold back what I think to her. "What ever cross you think you have to bear is nothing compared to what we have to bear."

In a tone that seems uncharacteristically mature and serious, even with the Capitol accent, she says, "You think I don't know that? I have been doing this for some time now, I know full well the burden you have in representing your district. Please, I'm here to help you."

Maybe I was wrong about her initially. For being a Capitol-raised woman she seems rather genuine and more understanding of us. Her motivations to help may be a bit...skewed for lack of a better word, but nonetheless she does genuinely mean well for the poorest district's tributes. I glance over to Katniss, and her face seems to imply that she's thinking the same thing.

* * *

The first place Effie brings us is to our bedrooms in the train's residential car. The first room we come across is designated as Katniss's. She opens the door and shows her the layout of the room while I waited outside the door. I thought the room in the justice building was nice, but this kind of layout far supersedes that room. I guess Effie wasn't lying when she said that the rooms were kind of a treat. The only thing I'm focusing on is the bed. _I'm gonna be having some good times in there_ , I think to myself. Effie then brings me to mine, and shows me ropes of the room.

"You'll find the bed more comfortable than anything before," Effie tells me, but I don't find any condescending undercurrents mocking us, "the shower room has endless options for water temperature and washing liquid, and everything you'll need is in the dresser near to the bed. Get cleaned up, and we will get started. I'll go get Haymitch, probably in the bar car. Don't take too long, dinner will be served in about half an hour." The way she says he last phrase makes me chuckle slightly.

The first thing I do is see what's available to wear, and the sight of what's in the drawers makes me break out in laughter.

"You have got to be kidding me with this," I say to myself. All that's in there are a bunch of brightly colored outfits trademark to the extravagant Capitol style. I finally find a black outfit that I feel is suitable for me, and lay it out on the bed. The bathroom is another thing entirely, it's huge. At least half the room is solely the shower, and it has a huge number of buttons. One produces a lava hot stream, and another makes one that's colder than the water me and Katniss use to clean ourselves with in basins. I have to wonder why that's even an option, cause that'll give anybody hypothermia. Others produce streams that are clearly some kind of soap, and they smell like fruits and a bunch of other things I don't recognize. A button outside the shower seemed to turn on some kind of warm air flow, probably to dry off in seconds.

I take the towel in the room and the outfit and the bed, and I sneak to Katniss's room. I take all of my clothes off, and place my new outfit on her bed next to her outfit, which is more like an outfit that can barely pass as a short dress. I open her shower door a bit, and find her struggling with the buttons, until she finds a temperature good for her, and she strips herself down, lets her hair down, and steps in the shower, clearly reveling in the warm water. When her hands are pressing against the wall away from me, I take the chance to sneak in and place myself against her back, and she seems to shiver at the touch of me.

"Had some trouble with the buttons, Catnip?" I ask her with a degree of desire, as I run my hands up her hips and up her front, to her perfect breasts.

She grinds herself against me, making me groan in pleasure. She suggestively says, "What? You couldn't figure out how to use it, so you just came in and waited for me to do so?"

I turn her to face me and say, "Of course I did."

The sight of her naked curvaceous body glistening with shower water makes my desire shoot through the roof. When her eyes finally meet mine, all I can see are dark black eyes lusting for me. I feel like the god of sex when I see her lusting so much. She reaches her hand down to where I'm ready and eager for her, gripping me as tight as her body does. The sensation of her smooth hand and the warm water is enough to almost push me over the edge Before I do, I grab her hands and hold them above her head with one hand and she smiles at me, eager for what comes next.

My lips crashed onto hers aggressively, eager to pent out the emotion I've been holding in for what felt like the last four hours. She's clearly doing the same as she kisses me with equal force. I return her favor and run hand down to where I feel her as ready for me as I am for her. I place two fingers at her most sensitive spot, and circle as she begins to moan louder and louder, as I lock my lips with hers to absorb her moans. I break free enough to growl to her, "You're fucking beautiful Cat." With that, I finally push her over the edge, her loud moans very likely heard across the train.

We have no time to savor anything, before she fully recovers, I lift her above me and enter her with full force, our breathing heavy and strained. Her hands reach around me as I set a rapid pace, and she scratches my back with enormous pressure, causing me pain and pleasure simultaneously. I eventually move faster, her mouth moving to my neck, biting and grazing me animalistically. And then she reaches her peak again, bringing me with her, primally screaming each other's names as we drift into white hot oblivion which then fades back to reality, back to her and me.

As our breathing levels out, Katniss musters the strength to mutter, "I think we should clean up about now." She presses a button that turns the spray into a lavender-scented lather spray that then switches back to the water, fully cleaning is off and leaving us free of the dirt that we didn't realize we were covered in.

I whisper in her ear, "I dig the clothes you put out," as we finish showering.

"Gale. You won't believe the horrible clothes they have in that dresser," she tells me.

"Well that makes two of us."

After we get dressed, she shows me her dresser, and I couldn't help but let out a scream of laughter, because the image of her wearing these flashy pieces of cloth that are called dresses is more than I can handle. I look back at her, where she's giving me a "Fuck you" face. After combing her hair, I keep her from braiding it, insisting, "You look far better with your hair down in that getup."

The next thing we realize is Effie barging in on us, she really needs to learn to knock. She looks at me and shakes her head. "Gale, your room is next door. Though even I can take a guess that one room is probably going to be vacant for the ride." After thinking aloud to herself, she tells us to follow her to where we'll eat dinner. Well, I guess we didn't get off to too bad a start with her. But I can probably guarantee that our start with Haymitch Abernathy, our sole mentor and sole hope at receiving help from outside the arena, will not be so positive.

* * *

When we reached the rather extravagant dinner table, we find Haymitch with a bottle of what looks like whiskey. No surprise. Surprisingly, he seems to be sober enough to notice that we entered, a surprise he notices in all three of us apparently. "What, did you expect for me to be completely wasted."

I just shrug in response and give a chuckle. As we sit down, Effie with Haymitch, and Katniss with me, I consider that this guy is not as bad as the district makes him out to be. "So. Got any advice."

His response is to embrace the probability if our imminent demises. That destroyed any faith I had in him. I look at Katniss and she obviously feels the same.

Him aside, I see all this food and I immediately think of my family and the rest of the district, and how their going hungry, compared to the surplus of food. I figure that I have to eat whatever I can. If I can curb my hunger before the games, I can be at my strongest for the longest. The nearby servants bring us an aromatic soup that tasted and smelled so good, I couldn't help but eat it. Katniss used her utensils, but I was more hands-on. Effie visibly winced at me, while Haymitch reciprocated my earlier humorous support and smiling past his bottle. Katniss giggles a bit at Effie's reaction.

Haymitch then stands up, and Effie sarcastically asks, "Going for another nap, Haymitch?"

He responds, "We have a reaping recap to watch," to Effie's obvious utter shock. "Well, sweetheart, what are we waiting for."

He brings us to what apparently is the television room, he sits in his own chair next to Effie, and Katniss sits on a chair with me, suspending her legs over the armrest and relaxes into my chest. I see out of the corner of my eye Haymitch and Effie looking at us. They look at each other sometimes, their faces flashing between different emotions, but they mostly appear piteous towards us. We kind of made history in being the only romantically involved couple to be reaped into the games. Everyone is probably thinking about what this will mean for this year's games. People are likely speculating about us and how we plan to move forward, since even if we can take out everyone else, only one person can emerge. People are probably hoping me somehow make it to the end just the two of us, to see what we'll do then.

I don't have time to ponder the subject further when the recap begins. The recap starts with District 1. It's the first career district, where children train at a special and illegal academy, normally until their 18 and then volunteer. Even though it is illegal, the career districts have such close ties to the Capitol that they get away with it easily. They are also the deadliest of the tributes, winning it almost every year. Districts 2 and 4 are the other two career districts.

The tributes from 1 will clearly be a force to reckon with, albeit their appearances are deceiving. The girl is small, blonde hair, maybe Katniss's age, but a very clear bloodlust in her eyes. If I know careers well enough, she'll have been trained in one particular weapon all her life, but be quite proficient at others as well. The boy is much bigger, likely the same age. He has darker hair with a much more boyish than a manly visage. He has the same kind of clear bloodlust as his district partner. The District 2 tributes appear much more dangerous. The girl is smaller than even Katniss, but her eyes make it obvious that her bloodlust is far stronger than the District 1 tributes combined. She looks like a deadly predator, a spider waiting for you to fall into its web. The boy is huge, definitely my age, and maybe even close to my size and musculature. He also has a menacing smile on his face, making it clear that he is already a killer. District 3 doesn't appear intimidating, and the District 4 tributes appear meek compared to the other two. They'll likely be little more than pawns for the first two districts to use as shields.

The only other tribute that grabs my attention is the District 5 girl. She appears thin, and rather small. I sense something about her, something I can't put my finger on. I don't feel threatened, but I do feel something towards her, and I don't know why. Regardless, I'm gonna be keeping my eye on her.

The other recap reapings go uneventful, but when we get to District 11, that changes. The girl they call up is so tiny, she's gotta be twelve. I feel Katniss grasp around my body in a tight embrace, and I hear her gasp. She's so small, doesn't even look bigger than Prim. How could she have been selected, what are the odds of two first-time girls from the outlying districts getting reaped? Whatever the case may be, this reaping turned out differently, because when the escort, apparently aware of the events in 12, asked for a volunteer, there was only silence. This made me shed a tear, because it reminded me of Prim, but the effect was much greater on Catnip. I felt her lose herself to her sobbing right after that happened. She immediately looked at me with a determination that I shot back at her, we were going to protect this little girl however we could once the Games begin. I'm very certain that we both were comforted and intimidated by the boy they called up, he was big just like me and the District 1 boy. I felt comfort in knowing that the little girl had a partner strong enough to protect her.

Finally, it's our turn in the recap. I'm willing to bet were considered the grand finale. It's almost too much to see it again, but I force myself to look. I have to see what others would see and perceive of the two of us. Katniss begins to cry once again when she sees Prim in the aisle. For others this a recap, for us this is reliving. After she volunteers, the sight of the district salute rejuvenates some comfort within me, knowing that they are honoring us right now, not for sacrifice but for respect in what we will have to go through. I'm willing to bet that the majority of the other tributes will feel more threatened by me and my size over Katniss, not just because of her size, but because they saw her in an emotional and diminutive state. I figure people will see me as the valuable one to have as an ally, the one who will be a threat.

Then we see Caesar's personal interview with someone, usually a game maker, former or current. This year is the current one, a guy named Seneca Crane, dressed in red with an ornately shaved beard. They go over each of the districts briefly, but when they talk about us, it's very developed and spoken of.

"Now, Seneca, let's take some time to talk about the events in District 12. What do you make of it?" Caesar asks the question with a tone of wonder, as if he was talking about gossip topics.

Seneca responds, "It's always a big deal when we have volunteers from outlying districts. I found that very interesting, and I will admit that I didn't expect it. It kind of moved me a bit." I'm a little surprised at how he seems rather emotional and sensitive given his profession.

"That's right, that girl she volunteered for is her sister. But, more importantly, what about her obvious relationship with the boy?"

"That will be something to keep an eye on." The guy isn't lying, he's right, people should keep an eye on us. "It's something that myself and others have never seen. In our experiences, a relationship typically develops between the tributes in the interim time. With the obvious intimate relationship the tributes from 12 have, they may bring a new spin on these games that has never happened. I can guarantee these will be the most interesting non-quarter quell games we have ever had."

With that, the recap ends. I want to be angry with Seneca's comments on me and Katniss's relationship as a source of entertainment for the crowd, but I'm too emotionally exhausted to be. Katniss herself appears drained as well from the events of the day as well. She's clearly awake, but not moving at all.

Haymitch suddenly interjects, "Well! That was interesting wasn't it? Now, I'm gonna go get some sleep."

He leaves it at that. I can't believe him. But right now, I couldn't care less, all I want is to get some sleep with Katniss and sleep off the emotional torrent we both have suffered today.

Effie herself makes a comment, "Okay you two, go to your rooms, and get some sleep. We have a busy day coming up, and I need you to be well-rested."

"Yeah, sure thing Effie," I respond rather groggily. I hook my right arm under Katniss's knees and the other on her waist. I carry her over to the room we're basically sharing now, and I sit her on the bed. I strip myself to the boxers I found in the dresser that weren't skin tight, and she mustered enough strength to remove her small dress. We remove the covers and I crawl in and lay on my back, with Katniss crawling up and resting her head on me, and sprawling her leg over me. We lay there for less than a minute before sleep claims us. The last thing I remember saying is, "Night, Catnip."

* * *

 _Song credit: The Heart Want What It Wants by Selena Gomez._


	4. The Future Seemed So Bright

**A/N: For now, I'll be putting chapters up back to back. Once I get to the tenth chapter, I'll do it slower. Thank you for those who have given me reviews for the last few chapters.**

 **Disclaimer: I own nothing.**

* * *

 **The Future Seemed So Bright**

When I wake up, the first thing I'm aware of is the feeling of something across my chest. I eventually realize that Katniss woke up before me. She's resting her head right over my heart and tracing her hand down my body. Effie wasn't lying when she said that these beds were so comfortable. If I'm being honest, I have to say that this is the most relaxed and comfortable I ever felt. Then the cruel irony sinks in, I feel so relaxed and secure when in a matter of a week, I'll be in the most dangerous place possible, and I can't do anything about it. Before the tragedy at the reaping, out futures seemed comparably bright. But right now is all there is, and right now I'm with Katniss.

She whispers, "Morning, Gale."

"Morning, Catnip."

She looks at me through her shaded eyes, the look on her face screams contentment with the moment. I ask her, "How long do you think we have before Effie comes running in here?"

She looks at the clock, and she says, "More than enough."

Her eyes darken with desire when they return to mine, as I know mine do as well. She rolls herself on top of me and kisses me gently. This time we savor the moment, unlike our last time, where we just had at one another with animalistic desire, we do things slower. I reach my hands around her and reach for the clasp of her black bra. I break our kiss long enough to humorously groan, "Let's just hope she's smart enough to knock this time." We both give a nice little laugh at that, and then I undo and remove her bra and discard it. I push Katniss upright and start running my lips around her torso, ending at her nipples. I close my mouth around one of them, and suck at it. I give it a little nibble, forcing a groan from her. I repeat this with the other, and she starts begging me, "Fucking bite me harder, Gale." That's an order I follow with no question. When I finally break away from her breasts, she presses me down on my back, and holds my wrists down. Katniss lasciviously says, "Stay still."

She throws back the quilts and lowers her head to my chest, reciprocating my earlier gift to her, and then some. She bites me hard, and earns loud groans from me. She scratches down my chest hard enough to leave a trail of red paths down my body.

And then there was no more playing, she lowers herself further and lifts my hips to take my boxers off, reducing me to being completely nude. She takes me, hard and ready, in her hand and begins a slow stroking pace. My breathing completely goes arrhythmic, and she nearly brings me to oblivion before she pulls herself away. She ask me, "Did you like that?"

She already knows the answer, but I still give her one. I answer her by removing her skimpy underwear and throwing it to the floor. She seems determined to keep her control this time around, since she pushes my hands to the bed yet again. "Now be a good boy, and stay still," she lustfully commands me. She takes me in her hand again, and holds it to her wet entrance, before she lowers herself onto me to the hilt.

She sets a slow and steady pace, pressing down against my chest, leaving even more scratches than before. I respond with upward thrusts of my own, and this game of ours continues until I reach my hand to her most sensitive spot, and force her to her peak, bring myself with her. Unlike last time, this was more quiet, not sex, but lovemaking, much like our first time. She collapses against my chest, and wraps her arms around me, and wraps us in the quilts again.

"You should be like that more-"

Before I get the chance to finish my thought, Effie suddenly barges in. "Gale breakfast is rea-" She just stares at us, obviously noticing that we're both naked, and very well knowing what we just did.

We both just angrily ask her how her morning is going, and she responds by turning her back to us, saying that we have half an hour to get ready for breakfast, before storming out of the room. She's definitely gonna be knocking on the door from this point on. The look on Catnip's face means she thinks the same. She lowers her lips to mine, obviously wanting to go at it again. As much as I want too, as much I nearly give in, I have to be the more rational one. "Catnip, we need to. We gotta somehow get at least on her good side."

She grimaces in concession, and we get up to shower, with me reminding her of what we can do in the shower.

* * *

We finally emerge from the room in decent outfits we both feel lucky to find. When we get to the table, we find a huge buffet waiting for us. I guess breakfast is done yourself, and dinner is done for you. The bacon, sausages, eggs, and even the aroma of the hot chocolate and coffee is so tantalizing. Katniss never liked coffee, but she seems very drawn to the hot chocolate. The look on her face make sit clear she's still hesitant to indulge when the rest of 12 and our families are going hungry.

"Catnip, there's no point in starving ourselves here. We need to build our strength while we still can."

Her face collapses in acquiescence, and we fill our stomachs with bacon, sausages, and various other meat products. They taste so much more different than what we are used to, but meats are our best friends, since we've been living off of hunting for three years now.

We then savor our drinks. That's actually an understatement with Katniss, she's more than savoring her hot chocolate.

"I didn't know that you liked that stuff THAT much Catnip."

"Gale," she finally manages to croak when she swallows what's left in her mouth. "You of all people should know how much I like savoring what I love," she continues with an overt undercurrent of lust. I just smile in response.

With no one in the car with us, we find a soft chair nearby, where we relax into one another, until Effie and Haymitch walk in. I can't tell if we were earlier than they were, or if we were so late that they left for something and came back. Regardless, we take our places back at the buffet table, where the only thing Haymitch has with him is a bottle of what looks like water, but probably isn't. The way he smiles at us indicates that he knows of our little fiasco with Effie earlier.

I know I'm probably gonna be angry at his response, but I still ask, "Got any advice for us?"

"You want some advice lover boy. Stay. Alive."

I guess that was better "advice" than what he gave us yesterday.

My opinion drops even lower when all he does for two minutes is constantly eat. Katniss is clearly more enraged than I am even. She makes this obvious when she takes out a knife and stabs between his fingers into the placemat when his obsession turns to the jam.

Effie gasps, "This is mahogany." All I do is smile slightly.

Haymitch doesn't look scared, in fact, he's very nonchalant. "Congratulations," he says sarcastically, "just killed a perfectly good tablecloth." However I do see evidence of a smile on his face.

"Let's cut the bullshit. Are you gonna help us or not," Katniss says with a seriously deep tone of anger and resentment.

"Sweetheart, that depends. If you can learn to do something other than him."

My anger shoots through the roof. Taking another knife, I hurl it right at the bottle next to him, shattering it to pieces. Effie simply leaves the room, muttering something about not liking the impropriety here. He snidely murmurs, "Looks like you two are actually fighters. What else can both of you do?"

I take the initiative to clarify Catnip's strength, "Katniss is the best hunter I've ever met. She can shoot anything dead in one of their eyes every time. If she has a bow and arrow, she is the deadliest woman."

She smiles at my compliments to her before she gives her own for me. "Gale is strong in a hand-to-hand fight, and as you can see, a knife thrower. He is also the best trap setter I've ever met. If he sets a trap, you're never gonna see it. And they never fail."

Haymitch, in his annoying drunken voice, comments, "You do know that you're competitors here, right?"

We both give him a death stare, making it obvious even to his drunken self that we weren't, aren't, and will never be competitors.

Luckily, he gets the message and acquiesces. "Fine. You guys are strong with your skill sets, and can survive in the wilderness. You guys are used to going hungry, but you look like you've been well-fed for a time, you don't need anything handed to you. The careers will likely underestimate you. That and the story of the star-crossed lovers of District 12 will ring very well with the sponsors."

I can't believe it, the Capitol already wants to make sport and publicize our relationship, and now he wants to use our relationship as a strategy. "No."

"No, what?"

This is the most oblivious human being I ever met. "No. We are not using our relationship as a fucking strategy. The Capitol already wants to make sport of it."

"If we don't use it as a strategy, then it's a liability. And it doesn't matter, now that you're here, everyone about you is now the Capitol's business. And once you're in that arena, everything you do, will be filmed. I know you truly love each other, no one can deny it, but we can use it to your advantage."

I ultimately concede to his logic, though by no means am I even content with it. Katniss then interjects, "Do you actually have any advice for us, or are you gonna just tell us what we can learn from anyone?"

He looks at us, his face dropped in his thoughts. He ultimately decides to help us, and says, "Okay. This is gonna go on for a few days. I'll help you as the days go on. I'll also try to be sober to help. The most important thing are sponsors, and what you do over these next few days will determine how much help you get in that arena."

I glance to Katniss, and she shares my current look. We both currently find that he may be genuinely interested in our welfare after all. He tells us about how everything we do, except for what's in our rooms, will be monitored by the game makers, and that at the end of it all, we get a score, the higher the score, the better chance of getting sponsors to send us things like food, medicines, and even matches to make fires. He also clarified that fires are very dangerous, because the smoke and light act as a beacon to location for other tributes, especially the careers. Fires should be kept tiny enough that it will take a lot to notice, and are more for cooking than anything else. We continue this conversation for some time, until all three of us agree to go to our rooms for one last little respite.

* * *

When we were in our room, I realize that my emotions are starting to skyrocket in intensity. This whole time, I barely shed a tear for myself, and my own plight. But when Effie came and told us we had an hour until we reached the Capitol, and us reaching it would be marked by us going through a long tunnel, I realize how close to the end of my life I am. I impulsively retreated to the bathroom and stripped everything off, and stepped in, setting the water to the hottest temperature I could stand, letting the water cathartically wash over me, and attempt to allow my emotions to run free. My emotions skyrocket as I let tears fall from my eyes against my already wet face. I feel like I'm there forever, when I feel a pair of small hands trace across my chest, wrapping around me from behind.

Katniss asks me, with a tone of sorrow, "Are you ok, Gale?"

"No, Catnip. All this time we were talking, I realize that we kept conversing as if we were both capable of making it out alive. There is only a single victor that can emerge."

She turns me around to face her, and she pulls me down to her face, and quietly sings soothing melodies in my ear. It helps the rest of my emotions come out in a howl of sobs. When the emotion has been freed, I lower my lips to hers, in a gentle romantic union. She reaches behind me to turn the shower off, and she presses down on me with her arms and lifts herself up and wraps her legs around my back. I carry her directly to the bedroom, not caring that we were still soaking wet. I lower her to the silky sheets, where our lips continue to lock together, our tongues caught in a passionate and powerful dance. We lay there and let the world melt away from existence for the moment.

Right afterwards, we get partially redressed, and we simply just lay in bed together. I feel so much better that I'm not repressing anything now, I'm free from the burden of the emotion of the events of the previous two days. Suddenly, we see the area outside the window dramatically darken, into the tunnel, marking the end of our train ride, into the viper's nest called the Capitol.

* * *

 _Song credit: Love The Way You Lie, pt. II by Rihanna ft. Eminem_


	5. I Am Born Again

**A/N: Thank you very much for all the reviews you have given me. I want to know what you guys actually think of my chapters thus far, and what I can do to improve them. I have had so much fun writing this.**

 **Disclaimer: I own nothing. All is property of Suzanne Collins.**

* * *

 **I Am Born Again**

The sheer darkness of the tunnel brings back a lot of dark memories. The dark memory of the loss of my father in the mining accident. I quickly close my eyes and cuddle into Catnip, she does the same with me, she's clearly suffering the same flashback I am with her own father. It feels like the tunnel continues forever. The tunnel runs through the mountains marking the border between the Capitol and rest of Panem.

I always think back to the times I had to go into the mines, as a practice for when I had my last reaping and would have to be in there as a full time job. Katniss couldn't do it. She lost it the first time we went back in after the accident. I was barely able to make it down without nearly losing it myself. After that day, I never saw her on the rickety elevator again. I was somewhat grateful, because I didn't want her down there. The mines were always dangerous, and we knew it, but we always thought it would never happen to us, not while someone we knew and loved was down there, but gate had a different plan.

It's incredibly ironic. The incident that killed my and Katniss's fathers was the worst and best thing that ever happened to me, and I hope her. Worst because we lost our fathers, and best for me because it brought me to Katniss. Of course I wish I still had my dad with me, but would I have still won Katniss's heart, even if that event didn't happen? I doubt it, the reason we met was because she was hunting because her father was no longer there to act as family man, and she had to assume the role in place of her catatonic mother.

"Gale, I wanna show you something." She gets up and pulls something out of her top drawer in the dresser. "Look at what Prim managed to sneak to me." It was the mockingjay pin I got for her birthday.

I smile. "How did she get that to you?"

"I gave it to her the day of the reaping, so that no harm would come to her, as I told her." Her face drops, indicating she thinks it failed. "She gave it back to me for the same reason."

"Catnip. It worked for her, because no harm came to her, she was reaped, but you saved her from it. And now, it's gonna ensure she never will come down with harm. Because you will go back to her."

The look on her face makes it clear that my words of inspiration worked. She smiles again, and then relaxes into me for a short stretch, until Effie walks in on us. I guess she didn't learn from last time. I'm just happy she missed our love session from less than 15 minutes ago. "Well now, here comes the big event," she declares, seemingly happy for what's coming up, "the tribute parade!"

Effie gestures for the two of us to come with her. She brings us to the dining car, and we emerge from the tunnel into the station for the Capitol, for the first time seeing the citizens of the Capitol for myself, and for Katniss. If I thought Effie looked horrible with her extravagant wigs, her unnaturally pale color and her outrageous outfits, the rest of the Capitol look like complete monstrosities. Despite this, I decide to appeal to Haymitch's suggestion of using our relationship to our own advantage, and I pull Katniss to me and give her a passionate kiss, a kiss she reciprocated. Even through the thick glass, I could hear a sharp increase in the uproar outside the train. We keep going until he train comes to a full stop, and when I break away from Katniss, she looks at me, and clearly was happy with that. Maybe it brought her some comfort she needed earlier, from the tunnels claustrophobic effects on us. I glance over to Haymitch, who just shakes his head and smiles. I hold Katniss to my chest, doubling as a show for the audience, and a comfort for her. I hope that's all she sees this as, something to make her feel better given the circumstances.

* * *

I'm guessing that the train station was to let the citizens of the Capitol take a look at us personally, since the train started up again and moved somewhere underground. Effie brought us inside the building nearby, where me and Katniss into different rooms, about four hours ago. Effie and the other three people in the room said they would make me look presentable for the parade.

First, they had requested me to strip naked, a prospect that took me a little bit to accept. When I finally did, they all looked at my body in shock, and kept murmuring about things they had to do. They made me lay down on a metal plate where they said that all the work would be done to make me presentable.

They started with hosing me down, to the point where it felt like I had just got out of the shower. One of the inhuman looking female stylists, with hair dyed slightly green and skin colored slightly gold, began mixing a bunch of chemicals hat she said would do something to make my skin glow. What she meant was remove several layers of my skin from my body, though by some miracle, the hair on my body was left untouched. The other barely recognizable human woman, with dyed pink skin and bright blue hair used a pair of tweezers to pluck away at my eyebrows. I genuinely thought that I would have no eyebrows left with how long she was doing it. She then took something that was buzzing, and ran it through my hair, cutting it down to a more healthy and neater style. The man washed it with some kind of blaming liquid as they called it, and it made my hair feel like the silk from the blankets. I hope that they do the same for Katniss's hair. Though, the guy who's washing my hair has bright purple ringlets going down his shoulders, and in the back of mind, I kind of fear for what he just did to my hair. At the end of it all, they gave me a good rinse and dry.

After everything and 1 more hour later, the pink-skinned woman urges, "Come, come. Stand up." All three of them just start gawking at my stark naked body, gasping at how I now look "remarkably human." I use that thinking to my advantage, to rationalize them off as more animals, like some kind of exotic peacocks or birds, rather than humans. It makes me feel more comfortable when I think of it that way. I don't know what they're checking for, but if i had to guess, probably any speck of dirt or something on my body, luckily, there were none. I didn't want to go through that for another second. I was so grateful that they didn't do anything to my most sensitive body part, and I hope Katniss was just as lucky. After giving me a good look-see, they all scream in joy, even the purple-haired guy squeals femininely. Curiously, I realize that I never got their names, I guess I didn't pay any mind to them when they introduced themselves, if they even did.

I decide to humor them a bit, saying "Thanks guys, I haven't felt this nice in my whole life."

The pink-skinned one responds, "Oh, well that's our job, making you nice and pristine for all of the audience to see." I don't know what I think about that. "Now stay just like this, we're gonna go get Portia."

They leave, and I'm here just completely buck nude, I'm tempted to put a robe on, but I don't know how literal these cleaner groups are in their commands. So I stay like this, but I do however cover my personal region. Right as I do, a woman walks in, she looks remarkably human. Her hair is actually a natural light gold blonde color, though not her natural color. If it's a wig, it's a damn good one, because it looks like it could be her real hair. Her skin is natural dark, like the tributes from 11. The only other evidence of her being from the Capitol is the pink aura around her eyes, though it doesn't look like it's dyed, it's like makeup.

"Hello there, Gale," even her Capitol accent isn't annoying, "I'm your stylist, Portia." She flashes me a smile, one that I genuinely return, which is rather weird given my current state.

"Are you a newbie? I've never seen you in any previous Games."

She nods, as she gives me a professional examination. She starts feeling my body, though not affectionately. It feels almost as if she's getting a feel for what she can tailor for me.

"Sucks that you got stuck with us isn't it?" District 12 is the default district for anyone new. Nobody who's anybody would choose our loser district.

"Whether you choose to believe it or not? Me and my stylist partner Cinna, Katniss's stylist, actually wanted District 12." She proceeds to finish her examination, and hands me the medical robe in the room. "Sit with me Gale."

Once I feel nicely covered, I sit with her. She presses a button on the nearby table, and a sandwich and a glass of water pop up. My rage shoots through the roof, because these people have it so fucking easy. They just gotta press buttons and food is given to them, while me and Katniss have spent our whole lives scrounging and struggling to even get decent meals. I reluctantly take the glass and sandwich, and simply put them down.

"Gale," Portia interjects, "I'm sorry."

I glance to her, and she seems a bit withdrawn, I guess my body and face speak volumes. The fact that she's even acknowledging what she correctly believes I'm thinking speaks volumes of its own. I gain a new kind of respect for her.

"Now. Let's talk about you and Katniss's chariot parade outfits. Tradition dictates that we represent the district's primary industry. In your case that's coal."

I give a nod in response. Every other Hunger Games parade I've seen presents our district as a sexualized, or even just a plain coal miner. In fact, people never paid any mind to us, so I kind of have to wonder what these people have planned, given they wanted us. "You're not putting us in a simple coal miner's outfit to time around, are you?"

Portia gives an approving smile. "Glad to see you got the body and brain. Hard to find them combined in one."

I laugh at that, an actual genuine laugh.

"Anyways, we want to change it. The chariot outfits will represent your industry, but in a much different manner. We will represent what coal itself does best."

"I don't follow."

"You'll find out what I mean. But first, let's get you _into_ your outfit."

Something about her makes me believe that this year, District 12 may actually leave a lasting impression.

* * *

The outfit she puts on me is pitch black, no surprise, and is rather tight. It fits nicely against my legs, and the sleeveless top traces nicely over the figure of my entire torso, leaving very little to imagination. Strangely, I feel powerful in it, especially when I see my reflection.

Portia snaps me out of my hypnotic state. "Gale, let's head down to Katniss and Cinna, they're already waiting at the chariot."

When we get out to the subterranean-looking area full of horses and carriages, I search for Katniss I see someone, a girl waving me down, and her hair done in an ornate braid tiara-like style, and dressed in the same kind of black outfit I'm wearing, in the form of a cat-suit. Portia confirms she and the dark-skinned man with her are Katniss and Cinna. The first thing I do is start running for them. I pay no mind to the various other females trying to get my attention. As I get closer, she starts running to me as well. Once we reach one another, I lift her into the air, and our lips meet and fiery passion. Though we do keep it tame enough that it doesn't go further than that. I can imagine that the scene would indicate that we've been separated for weeks, not a few hours, but I guess that can be a testament to how close we are.

I hear a male voice call out to us, and that's what finally gets to stop and come back to reality. "You must be Gale, I'm Cinna." He reaches his hand out and I give him a nice handshake. He's noticeably human, even more so than Portia, because the only thing making it clear he's from the Capitol is the slight gold makeup on his eyes. Even his accent barely carries a hint of the Capitol.

"Nice to meet you, rumor has it you wanted District 12."

He gives a smile and confirms it. He then pulls out what looks like a match with a blue flame on the tip.

Catnip asks, "What's that for?"

A feminine voice answers, "That's what's gonna make District 12 shine brightly this year."

"Uh, Catnip. This is Portia."

They greet each other as well, and with formalities out of the way, we get to the real subject of conversation.

I take the initiative. "What is that?"

Cinna answers, "A synthetic flame, it'll light a certain area in the back of the outfit with outspread flames. It's not real or hot."

Katniss whimpers, "Looks real enough to me."

Portia reminds her that is the idea. I look back at her and realize what she meant by "what coal does best." She read my face well and responds with a wide grin.

Cinna ends the conversation. "Alright let's get you two ready, the parade will begin shortly."

With that, we get on the chariot, and they use a blow torch-like device to ignite our suits. The fake flames are not hot, just like they said, and they spread outwards, almost like wings.

With that, the grand doors open to a large avenue as the grandiose music commences, signaling for the chariots to start moving. The horses are so well-trained, they automatically move at the sound of it starting, immediately with District 1. When we finally emerge from the facility confines ourselves, the crowd's already loud cheering explodes into something far more when they see us. They start throwing everything good towards us, flowers, and even wigs and hats. I spot a large banner projecting us outward. We seem to be a grand attraction for the event. I take Katniss's hand in mine. "They'll love it, if they don't love us already."

She smiles, and we raise our joined hands in an expression of unity, a unity we don't see among any of the other tribute teams, and the crowd goes even more wild. When we reach the large city circle at the end of the avenue, the flames behind us go out, startling both of us.

And then he emerges. President Snow.

"Welcome! Welcome! Tributes. We welcome you…"

The rest of his speech is lost to us, and then suddenly the chariots begin moving back to the entrance.

When we get back, Cinna's applauding us, "That was amazing."

Haymitch and Effie are with him. Effie's cheering about how me and Katniss are all anyone's gonna be talking about.

Haymitch somewhat dryly remarks, "So brave."

He wants to be kind of sarcastic or dry, so will I. "Are you sure you should be near an open flame?"

He gives a slightly cocky smile. "A fake flame? Are you sure you-"

His pause is accompanied by an obvious change in focus. Me and Katniss follow his eyes, where we find the District 2 boy glaring daggers at us. Apparently we've outshone everyone tonight, even the careers. I don't know what that will mean for us.

* * *

 _Song credit: Wide Awake by Katy Perry_


	6. To Feel Alright

**A/N: For some of you, I'm giving you guys a slight warning. I realize that with how my story is currently going, it'd be over in less than 20 chapters. I'm gonna slow it down, and begin focusing a lot on the days leading up to the Games. There'll be a lot of personal moments between Gale and Katniss.**

 **Disclaimer: I own nothing**

* * *

 **To Feel Alright**

Haymitch decides that it would be safer for us to speak away from the other tributes. With how the District 2 male is looking at us, I actually fully agree with him for a change. We make our way over to what are the tribute living quarters. According to Effie, each district has its own floor.

"And since you're from 12, you get the penthouse." Her tone implies it's one of the benefits of being the escort for the poorest district. "It even has direct access to the roof."

The elevator is far smoother than the elevator to the mines, it doesn't feel like it could literally just fall at any second. It still brings back those dark memories of being lowered into those mines. Ironically, I never have to go through that again, because I'll either die here, or if by some miracle I survive this, everything will be handed to me from the Capitol. I'm not sure which one I prefer more.

Our living quarters are pretty much as far as you can get from the conditions in the Seam. We went from houses the size of the bedroom in the train to a suite as enormous as the justice building. "So Katniss, this room is yours," gesturing to the room on the right. "Gale, yours is here." Gesturing to the room on the left. "Though I know only one will actually be used."

Katniss and I shoot each other lascivious smiles.

"So. Go ahead. Make yourselves right at home. We don't have much to do, but dinner is in a couple hours." With that she walks off.

"Your room, or mine Catnip?"

She simply grabs my arm and drags me to her bathroom. The first thing I did was start removing the braids in her hair, which was softer than even the silky blankets from the train. I then took off her catsuit, and immediately saw how she had absolutely no hair from the eyebrows down. The sight of her glowing body mesmerized me. When she removed my shirt, she immediately seemed rather envious that I didn't get the same harsh treatment she did, though her expression changed quickly to desiring. She quickly ripped my pants from my body, and dragged me into the shower.

The warm water washed away all the unnecessary makeup from Katniss's face, and washed away all the sweat from our bodies.

I locked my lips with hers and pressed her against the shower wall behind her. She responds with equal ferocity and desire as she reached down to where I was ready for her. She began running her hand up and down my rigid length, forcing groans from my throat. She responds with predatory growls of her own. I eventually lose control of myself, and I force her arms above her head as I forcefully kiss and suck at her neck. Her moans drive me nearly insane, and I release her hands and my mouth travels down her body. I eventually lower myself to her most sensitive area, an area already warm and wet, not from the shower.

I use my tongue to part her lower set of lips, and then circle her sensitive bundle of nerves. I repeat this over and over, she cries out my name over and over, until she lets out a loud scream. I'm pretty sure that everyone else had heard. I crawl my way back up her body, and before she fully recovers, I enter her in full. She wraps her arms around my neck and back, and begins biting into my shoulder. I don't give her any kind respite, I set a rapid fierce pace, one that she tries to reciprocate while she's still recovering from her first high. I lower my free hand between us and use my finger to stimulate her sensitive spot again. Eventually, she falls off the edge, biting hard and screaming into my shoulder. She brings me with her this time, forcing a loud groan from me. My legs give out from below me, landing me and Katniss on the shower floor, me on my back.

As we both come down from our high, my body still within her, I tell her, "I love you, Catnip."

She sits up, looking at me. "I love you too." She comes back down for another strong kiss.

* * *

We come to dinner, where Effie and Haymitch are waiting for us. If they heard our prior indiscretions, they don't give any indication they did. But that aside, the table is huge and full of a bunch of extravagant looking foods. This far outweighs what we got on the train. We simply sat down across from the two of them, and just find some simple things to eat.

Haymitch starts out the conversation. "The next three days are the most important days for both of you. Training."

Being more of a talker, I choose to respond first. "What do we do?"

"Don't show the other tributes what you're good with, that they don't know about. Gale, that would be your knife-throwing and traps, Katniss that's your archery and hunting skills."

Katniss articulates my thought, "Then what should we do?"

"Practice survival skills. Fire-setting, plant identification, etc."

Effie comes in. "You have to hide what the others can't know about you."

I think I understand what she means, "Keep our strengths a secret."

Haymitch finishes that, "Until your private session four days from now."

Effie returns to talking, "On that day, you show your strongest skills. Normally these are skills that legitimize you as threats."

Katniss finally seems to understand. "So we can show off how we can live in the wilderness, but hide the fact that we're dangerous to the other tributes?"

Haymitch is clearly happy, "Exactly sweetheart."

Effie reminds us of one thing, "Of course, looking at Gale, you can't deny how strong he obviously is."

Haymitch seems surprised. "Effie, you said something actually smart."

She simply gives him a sarcastic smile.

"Anyways, she's right. You're obviously strong, that you can let the other tributes know right off the bat."

I start to wonder what else we should do, a thought that Effie seemed to articulate from me, "You should also take a look around at the other tributes, see what their strengths are. You find their strengths, you can find their weaknesses."

With that, me and Katniss finished our meals. I get an inkling that Effie is implying the careers. "You're referring to the careers, aren't you?"

She gives a smile at me. "Yes."

I speak up. "Effie, I never would've thought that you were like this."

Her face drops a little bit. "What do you mean? You didn't think that I would try to help you? You're as much my tributes as you are Haymitch's."

This woman knows how to confuse people as to her motives and what she's thinking. She never ceases to surprise me. "Now just as important as the training is the interview with Caesar afterwards. Katniss, come with me I need you to start practicing."

She seems a bit incredulous at the sudden announcement. "What do I need to practice that's more important than training?"

"Walking in your shoes properly."

Haymitch grabs my attention and gestures me to stay with him. "She'll be fine Gale. She has to learn how to walk in Effie's favored shoe type if she's gonna make a drastic impact on the audience."

That makes sense, the shoes I see Effie constantly walking in look like they could break someone's feet. "Anything you want to say to me?"

Haymitch smiles and leans forward. "Back to what Effie said earlier, you can show your obvious physical strength right off the bat."

"How should I do that? Lifting a bunch of metal balls off the ground?"

"That can work, but I was thinking more of strength in fighting."

"That shouldn't be too hard. Do they have a station for that or something?"

He nods, "The hand to hand combat station."

Haymitch decides that we have done enough. "Alright you two need to get off to sleep. _Sleep_ being the keyword." He says the last sentence singsongy, with a humorous smile, one that me and Katniss reciprocate.

Effie ends the conversation, telling us that training officially begins at 10 in the morning.

* * *

While we're lying together in her bed, I speak with Katniss about what we can do over the next couple of days. I weirdly feel this would so much harder and so much easier if either I or she weren't here. I wouldn't have to worry about losing someone I love if I win, but at the same time I would in effect be alone in my endeavors. At least with her here, I know that I'll have someone watching my back, just as I'll be watching hers.

"Think we should focus on the careers Catnip?"

"Definitely. They're the immediate threat in the arena."

"Okay. I'll take the boys, you the girls?"

"Okay."

I choose to change the subject to earlier today. "Were you angry earlier? When you saw that I wasn't hairless from the eyebrows down?"

She reaches up and pinches my nipple, "Hell yeah. You have any idea how much it hurts getting your hair ripped from your body."

"No."

"Of course you don't." She looks up at me, "Now, I am happy for the haircut they gave you."

The feeling is mutual, I feel better with a neater hair style. "I was kind of scared the blaming liquid was gonna turn my hair an extravagant color."

"You're not the only one."

She changes the subject again, "Do you think they're alright?"

"You mean our families back home?"

She nods. "I'm terrified for them."

"They'll be ok Catnip. The Mellarks will take care of them. Don't forget that Mr. Mellark probably still harbors feelings for your mother."

She seems somewhat torn at that, "As much as that comforts me, I still find it weird that he has or had feelings for my mother." She then perks up and looks at me. "How exactly did you know that, to begin with?"

That's a story I'm more than willing to tell her, and I smile. "Last year, one day at the Hob, after the last Games, my mother came up to me. She began talking with me, telling me and I distinctly remember her words, 'You know, nothing's gonna happen if you guys just keep staring at each other.'"

Katniss laughs at that. "Hazelle doesn't miss a thing."

Can't argue with that. "Then she told me a story, of when she and Mr. Mellark were young. Mentioning that Mr. Mellark had feelings for a girl who had an exceptional ability to heal. But he never confessed them, and she ran off with a coal miner with an exceptional singing voice. I have to admit I was surprised that your mother did that. My mom said she didn't want history to repeat itself with her daughters. Except, I got too scared, and I backed out."

Katniss props herself on her elbows, and says, "And then that girl came from nowhere trying to pick you up. And the rest is history."

"You know Catnip. I don't think I ever told you, that you are my first."

"What?"

"Looking back on that day, you mentioned something about how that girl implied to you that other girls weren't just nothing to me. Well, no girl meant anything to me until you. I'm your first, you're my first."

She leans up and straddles me, looking at me with a mix of surprise and elation. "Is that true?"

"Yeah it is Catnip."

She lowers her lips to mine. The flame between us is far calmer than earlier in the shower. She pulls me up to her running her nails gently down my back, and I run my hands up her back. The moment becomes more and more heated, and then I flip myself on top of her.

And then the night fades from us as we lose ourselves in our own reality.

* * *

 _Song Credit: Jar of Hearts by Christina Perri_


	7. Fire From The Sky

**Disclaimer: All is property of Suzanne Collins.**

* * *

 **Fire From the Sky**

I woke up in the morning to an annoying high-pitched ringing, which I realized was our small alarm clock. I saw that it said 7:30 AM. I wasn't sure how long we were up into the night, but Catnip was unaffected by the alarm. It was two and a half hours to go before training starts, so I chose to let Catnip get some more sleep.

That was about an hour ago. By then I'm fully conscious. She finally begins to rouse, and quickly sees that I'm already awake. "Sleep good, Catnip?"

She gives me an attempt at a smile, but I don't think her body is fully awake. "Never better."

"We gotta get up soon. We have to stay on Haymitch's good side."

She attempts to argue, "No we don't, we just gotta get on his good side again."

"Seriously, I let you sleep in for an hour."

"Can we just stay here for a little bit longer."

Okay, I'll wait a little bit. A short conversation should do the trick. "Fine. What exactly did Effie do with you last night?"

She immediately perks up a bit, "Something impossible."

"Haymitch told me you'd be learning to walk in her style of shoes."

"Those things are a fucking nightmare to walk in, it feels like my feet are taking like more than three times my bodyweight. That and I feel like a newborn deer trying to walk."

I just break out laughing. "Oh my god! I gotta see that."

She tickles me a little, obviously holding back a laugh of her own, "That's not funny!"

She wants to tickle me, fine. I return the favor, forcing her onto her back, and tickle her with far more force. "Oh hell yeah it is!"

When I stop and let her catch her breath, I stand up from the bed, and pick her up, my right arm under her waist, my other under her knees. "Maybe we should get ready now?"

"As long as that's not all we're doing."

I smile and carry her to the shower, my lips never leaving hers. We get out of the shower at around 9 AM even, we find a couple of black uniforms with 12 embroidered on either shoulder on the now-neatly-made bed. I'm not sure whether to be comforted or not at this, though by now I should be getting used to the lack of privacy. There are two notes, one on each, both say the same thing: _Standard uniform for tributes in training_. One is from Portia the other Cinna, making it obvious whose uniform was whose. We arrive at the table, where Cinna, Haymitch, Effie, and Portia are waiting for us, clearly having already eaten.

We simply make some small talk with them for awhile. It's mostly about Portia and Cinna becoming stylists. I'm impressed with how stylists are schooled in their art. No surprise, Portia and Cinna were both for all intents and purposes, prodigies. Not just because they are good stylists, but because they are willing to step outside the box, willing to do something different with a traditional concept. Portia constantly says that Cinna is the better of the two, but he constantly refutes that. I agree with him in that sense. She's just as responsible for the good ideas as he is. We kept going until Effie notices the time, 9:40.

Haymitch immediately takes us to the elevator, and tells us the same things he told us about yesterday. Though he adds, "The head trainer, Atala, will give you some advice. You should listen, though you basically already know what you need to. The last thing, try to make friends with the right people."

* * *

As always, Haymitch was right. I wish he warned us that the advice would largely be bullshit. As if most of us are gonna die from natural causes. Depends on what you define as natural. I will admit, the one piece of Atala's advice worth anything is that exposure can kill just as easily as a knife.

With that, me and Katniss split up to find the careers, and observe whatever tributes we can. As I move from I quickly found the District 2 male, I heard that his name is Cato, working with a sword. _A sword isn't useful for ranged attacks. If either Katniss or I get a bow, or I get a hold of knives, we can get him_.

I find the District 1 male, I got that his name is Marvel, working with spears. _Okay, so he's far deadlier from a distance. We either need to sneak up on him or make sure we have ranged weapons of our own. Only Katniss could get the drop on him effectively_.

The best thing going for us is that me and Katniss are used to surviving, we know what it's like to go hungry, we know what it's like to fend for ourselves. We can forage what we need from our environment. Districts 1 and 2 are well fed their whole lives, everything is handed to them. They're not experienced hunters like me and Katniss. I decide that District 4 likely won't present a great threat this year, they both lack the clear inherent ferocity of the other four careers.

With my brief reconnaissance finished, I go to look for Katniss, and I find her at the fire-starting station. I get there and we manage to make a fire for ourselves in a matter of minutes. We then move on to the station where we identify edible and inedible plants. The District 5 girl seems to be as good as Katniss is at this. Unfortunately, my skills fall short here. This is Katniss's area of expertise.

That's an understatement, the girl from 5 seems prodigious in her ability to recognize anything edible.

"Is it just me, or does the girl from 5 give off a weird vibe," Katniss asks me.

"She does, I don't know what to make of it."

We decide to train in the hand to hand as Haymitch suggested. Katniss went first, the tactics she learned are centralized on using her speed and her opponent's body weight against him/her, though they also teach her regular offensive moves useful for someone smaller than or as big as her. With me, they go down a predictable path. They teach me to remain on defense, waiting for the opponent to open themselves up to me, at which I give a barrage of offensive attacks.

While I'm in my training, I'm distracted by the sound of yelling. It's Cato yelling at one of the other boys about stealing his knife, something the boy denies. I don't recognize the kid, and I can't see his embroidered District number. I glance over to see Katniss looking up at something. It's the girl from 11 hiding in the ropes course, holding a knife no less. Little mischievous thing, I think to myself.

* * *

We spent the rest of our time before lunch at hand to hand, and we were both beyond exhausted by then. We filled our plates all with meats, since that's been our diet for practically three years now.

We're sitting next to each other alone, we didn't and don't have any idea where to start with making friends.

Though we don't know where to start, I suggest to Katniss, "Maybe we can start with the tributes from 11."

"Maybe. The girl I'm fine with, but I'm not certain about the boy being fully there. He seems to be trying to distance himself from everyone."

"Yeah, you're right about him. But it's still worth a try."

I change the subject, "What should we go to first after lunch is over?"

"Definitely not the hand to hand, at least not for the rest of the day."

"Yeah, I got more of a work out in one day than I have in my life."

She and I have a good laugh at that. We also discuss what we observed with the careers. Katniss started, mentioning how the girl from 1, whose name she didn't get, thinks she can use a bow.

"She's the worst shot I've ever seen."

We surmise that as long as she has a bow, she won't present much of a threat. We then discuss the District 2 girl, she heard her name is Clove, who is just like me, a knife-thrower. We agree that she'll be the deadlier of the two women.

We both seem comfortable in our shared belief that District 4 won't present much of a threat.

Before we can talk any further, I feel a surge of alarm flood me, the same feeling I get when I know there is a predator nearby when Katniss and I would go hunting. I glance over to Katniss, who's also sensing the same thing. We both turn around to find the careers eyeing me, not us, specifically me. District 4 is with them, but definitely doesn't have the same confidence or bloodlust as the other careers. The only one not looking at me is Marvel, he's eyeing Katniss as if she's a meal.

"Hi, I'm Cato," he says in a semi-loud voice.

They're talking to me, so I'll be the one doing the talking. "Hi. I'm leaving," I say with equal intensity, gathering up my and Catnip's plates.

"Funny guy."

I stop moving, "That wasn't a joke."

"It'd be worth your while to listen to us."

Katniss grabs my arm, silently indicating for me to humor them for now. I place the plates back on the table, before turning to face the fully. "You got one minute. Say your piece."

"We want you to join us. You can fight, and you're very much capable of surviving. When all the garbage is taken out," he eyes Katniss, "all bets are off. But you'll be a lot safer than you will be if you stay with people like her."

"Time's up." I stand up to my full height, and Katniss stands with me. "Let me ask you something." I start approaching him. "Is it gonna be safer for me, or safer for you?"

Cato's smile drops.

"That's what I thought. You know that I can kill you, which is why you want me to join you. But I'm not about to join a ragtag group of psychopaths who can't do shit for themselves. Understand?"

His face flies into full rage, but before he can or decides to do something, I turn and move towards Marvel, who's still glaring and Katniss. His eyes dart toward me in as I place my hands on either side of him on the table behind him. I use my height to my advantage, and lean inward against him, making him quiver in fear.

"If I catch you looking at my girlfriend like that again, you better hope they have a spare set of eyes for you. And if I catch you anywhere near her, you better hope they have a spare set of hands. Whimper if you understand."

He quivers and makes a noise.

I back up to our table, and snidely remark, "Good."

Marvel is trying to hide his fear behind a guise of anger, though it isn't working. I'm kind of reveling in that, because a guy from 12 is frightening a guy from 1.

Out of nowhere, Katniss yells out, "I better not see your slutty face anywhere near my boyfriend." She's menacingly holding the girl from 1 by her shirt against the wall behind her. "Cause if do, no surgeons ever gonna fix what I do to that face of yours! But then again that face needs a lot of fixing up anyways."

Her face drops in anger and embarrassment.

I notice that Cato is expressing intense anger, so I decide to probe at him one last time. "What's the matter Cato. Don't have the balls to take on a couple kids from 12?"

With that, he loses any semblance of sanity and screams, "Fine. Do and say whatever the fuck you want! It's gonna be your funerals anyway!"

I decide to rub a little more salt in his wounds. "I wouldn't be so sure about that."

All of the careers leave in rage, Cato in particular is the most enraged.

Katniss quickly answers my lingering question before I even have a chance to ask, "She was eyeing you the same way Marvel was eyeing me."

Once we sit back down, I notice a lot of the other tributes are eyeing us in a combination of shock, admiration, and even disbelief. The boy from 11 however looks at us in amusement, I guess they might have offered him a place among them too. If they did, there definitely wasn't a big show like there was just now. I wonder if the gamemakers could at some point see this. It doesn't surprise me that the careers would want him and myself to join them. We're both taller than all 6 of them, even Cato.

The rest of lunch went by uneventfully. After it ended, we went to all the survival skill stations we didn't initially get too. We now decided to try our hand at camouflage.

While me and Katniss are trying to figure out how to try and make ourselves invisible against a background, I notice that we picked up a shadow, the girl from 11. We both acknowledge her presence near us, but she doesn't retreat. We take advantage of that and ask her to come to us.

"Hi, I'm Rue." Her voice is low, she seems shy, though given what happened earlier, I don't blame her.

"Hello Rue, I'm Gale. This is Katniss."

She smiles at us, "Nice to meet you two."

Katniss inquires, "Have you been shadowing everyone here?"

She nods. "And listening in."

I immediately wonder if what she's heard is the primary reason she's here. She seems to read my face well, "The boys from 1 and 2 were talking about...who gets Katniss."

I suddenly see red, and Rue clearly sees this and steps back a bit. Katniss goes and comforts her, because I'm seeing red because of the careers, not at Rue.

Once I'm calm again, I ask Rue, "Anything else you heard? Or saw?"

She nods, seemingly no longer intimidated, "A lot of people are scared of you two, and there are few that are bent on wanting you as allies."

I immediately interject, "You're already one of our allies."

Katniss adds, "I wanted you as an ally the moment I saw...your reaping."

I smile at her and then at Katniss. "I think we'll stick with you and your partner."

She shrugs a bit, "Thresh isn't one for allies, he has a preference to do things alone." Okay so his name is Thresh, easy enough. "I don't blame him."

Before we could go any further, Atala whistles for us, and signaling the end of training for the night.

I let Rue know, "Well, see you tomorrow."

* * *

When we got back on our floor, Effie seemed a bit angry, but kept her words to herself, while Haymitch was much more gleeful. Evidently, word got out of our little scuffle with the Careers.

Even though the already knew about what happened, he kept asking us about the details, wanting to know first-hand what exactly happened. He seemed to love how me showed up the careers, and especially when we physically threatened both tributes from 1.

Effie wasn't so receptive to the insulting, though she didn't say anything. I guess she may not like what happened, but fully knows that it's no fault of our own. I'm grateful that put aside her own.

When asked us if we had successfully made any allies, we told him that Rue told us about how the other tributes were referring to us after the confrontation. He seemed rather amazed at what turned out, and just as equally astonished when we only chose Rue herself as an ally.

Before either of them could comment on our decision, I explained, "Rue is swift and sneaky, for more than anyone else here. So much so, she was shadowing everyone without them noticing, and even pulled the same thing with us, though she seemed to want us to notice her. Oh yeah, she was sneaky enough to steal Cato's knife and then hide in the ropes course, letting someone else take the blame for it."

Haymitch and Effie both gave a chuckle at that, to our surprise. "Okay, so she has skills of her own, is there anyone else?"

Katniss answered, "We wanted Thresh, Rue's District partner, as well, but Rue told us he's more solitary in nature. I don't trust any of the others."

I second what she said.

Effie seemed rather happy that we chose Rue as our sole ally, though Haymitch is rather skeptical at our single choice.

He didn't press on it, though I know for sure he doesn't agree with it. Regardless, he simply tells us to clean up and get to sleep. But first, Effie takes Katniss for some more practice with walking in high heeled shoes.

Right now, we're still in her shower, finally getting a chance to have one another in a precious moment of privacy. It's a relief, to have the sweat and strain of the day wash away in the water and the heat of our passion, before the exhaustion of the day overcomes us in her bed.

* * *

 _Song of credit: Make it Rain by Ed Sheeran_


	8. Tell You My Sins

**A/N: There won't be story progression here. This will exclusively be exploration of the relationship between Gale and Katniss, in the situation they are currently in. Maybe a little something that'll satisfy you Galeniss fans.**

 **Disclaimer: I own nothing.**

* * *

 **Tell You My Sins**

 _"Katniss! Katniss where are you!" I keep screaming trying to find her, I can hear her screaming my name. I try to follow the sound, but it keeps changing direction, and then just stops._

 _I finally find her, with Marvel and Cato holding her to the ground, and muffling her screams._

 _Suddenly I feel someone punch me in the chest. I try to move, but I can't. I hold the spot that I felt it, but when I look down, I see that I have blood all over my hands, with something protruding from my chest. I wasn't punched, I was stabbed. Clove gleefully moves right in front of me, and rips the blade from me, blood spurting from the wound with the knife. I collapse to the ground, where I feel her crawl above me, pinning my weakened body to the ground, the pain of the stab shooting through me at last, paralyzing me. She forces my face forward to watch what they're doing to her._

 _"Enjoy the show loverboy!" Clove sadistically mutters into my ear. Marvel removes Katniss's pants, and removes his own, forcing himself onto her._

 _I weakly croak, "Katniss!" I can barely breathe through the blood coming from my mouth._

 _All I can hear is Katniss screaming in pain, and Marvel is reveling in it. He keeps punching her and using a knife to slice at her face and stomach. Finally he stops, and Cato repeats, forcing himself onto her as well. He uses his sword to start cutting long gashes in her neck, avoiding hitting anything major. The both of them are reveling in the pain she and I are suffering. When Cato finishes, he raises the sword upward, and sends it in a downward motion right into Katniss's chest._

 _I scream one last time, "Katniss! No!"_

 _She becomes a fountain of blood, and I hear her desperately gasping for breath before her body just stops moving and goes completely still, limp and lifeless._

 _The next thing I feel is something warm rapidly going down the length of my neck. I quickly reach for my throat with my hand not holding my chest. I realize that there is flesh missing from my neck, my throat's been slashed, but at this point, I don't care. Katniss is dead, and now I want to be with her._

 _I feel Clove pull me onto my back, Marvel and Cato joining her as Cato plunges the sword right towards my face._

* * *

I shoot up, my breath labored and unstable. I hold my bare chest, and am relieved to find no knife, no wound, nothing. I'm alive.

But where's Katniss, Katniss isn't with me in the bed. I get up and start frantically yelling for her.

She comes running to me from the bathroom, "Gale what's wrong? You okay?"

Thank God she's alright. I run to her and hold her in my arms, tears flowing down my face. "It was so real Catnip."

She grips me tightly, clearly hearing the pain and fear in my raspy voice. "Gale. What happened?"

"I was forced to watch you die at their hands, Cato and Marvel."

She pulls her face back enough to look me in the eyes, before diving her lips onto mine. She pulls back enough to say, "I'm right here Gale. Nothing has happened, and nothing will happen. Okay?"

I pull enough strength to respond, "Okay. I don't wanna go back to sleep, I'm not going back in there."

She nods in response. She backs away from me, taking my hand, and bringing me to the window. She has me sit down against the corner of the wall. Before she can sit down with me, an Avox comes running in. Luckily, Katniss and I were wearing some clothing, I was wearing just pants, and so was she along with a skimpy top. The look on her face is wrought with worry, more than making up for her inability to speak.

Katniss speaks for me, "We're okay. But can you bring us some water?"

She nods and walks off. Katniss then sits across from me, on the other side of the window frame. "Something's telling me that. The careers killing me isn't the only reason that you screamed for me, is it?"

Perceptive woman. "No, it isn't. Something worse happened to you and I literally couldn't do anything to stop it."

Before either of us can continue, the Avox returns with two large cups and puts them in the space between us, and fills them.

I give her a thanks, and we fully drink them in one sitting. The cold feeling going down my neck and chest soothing me, bringing me to a much calmer state of mind. Katniss finishes her as quickly as I did mine. The Avox waited for us to finish, and when we did, we gave her our cups, and told her that would be it, and she can go back to sleep.

Alone once more, we sit there in silence for a minute, before she moves to relax herself against my chest, wrapping her arm around my back. I cuddle her to me tightly, unwilling to let her leave.

She starts using her free hand to trace the muscles of my body. "Gale. You said that you were forced to watch Cato and Marvel kill me. I think I can figure out what else they did, that you couldn't stop. Do I wanna know what they did to you?"

Whether or not she actually wants to, I answer her. "The moment I found you, Clove stabbed me in the chest." I start to tear up. "After you were...killed...I…she also slit my throat."

"Oh God, Gale."

"I'm so terrified right now. It seemed so easy yesterday to defy the careers, but now...I'm definitely not as confident as I was to say the least."

"Well, that makes two of us."

"What are we gonna do Catnip?"

"There's nothing that can be done right now. But what I know is that we won't have anything to worry about."

"How can you be so sure?"

"Cause we'll have each other's backs when the games begin. As long as we stay together, nothing will happen."

I'm grateful to her for being here, even though I know it means I will lose her or she will lose me. This would be so much harder if I had to do this alone. I rest my head on top of hers, still sobbing, but I'm comforted by the heat of her body against mine.

"Thanks Catnip." I start wondering why the Avox came running, but not Haymitch or Effie. "I'm surprised that Effie and Haymitch didn't come runnning."

I guess I spoke too soon, since both of them end up walking in. Effie's wearing a drastically different outfit than I'm used to seeing, an outfit that covers her fully, and her natural straight blonde hair is showing.

"You guys were just listening in on that weren't you." I kind of hope they did, cause I don't want to repeat what I just said.

Both of them nod before coming over and sit on the part of the sill across from us. Haymitch particularly takes my hands, the look on his face one of empathy. "Gale, I'm sorry. Is there anything we can do? For you two?"

"There's not much we can do about dreams is there?"

He just simply shrugs. Effie comes in, "Well. Maybe not. But we _can_ help you through it."

She sits across from us, sporting her signature smile. "Tell me, how did you two meet?"

Katniss turns and gives me a smile, one that I flash back. Good idea Effie, just change the atmosphere to something different. I start us out with, "Not under the best of circumstances."

Katniss finishes, "It was right after our father's were killed in the mining explosion' about four years ago. We were going so hungry, we were forced to illegally hunt out in the forest."

"She found one of my snares. I messed with her a bit, _reminding_ her that hunting out there is illegal. She nearly killed me for it."

Haymitch gave a laugh at that, Effie couldn't hold back a giggle.

"Of course I did, you looked like a man even then. I thought you actually would report me, what was I supposed to do?"

All four of us let out a loud belt of laughter.

"Gale and I became a thing three years later. After I saw someone flirting with him."

Effie let out a cute "Awww."

Haymitch just started laughing.

I change the subject, "What time is it?"

Haymitch answers, "Last I saw the clock I think it said 3 in the morning. We should get back to sleep."

Effie seems rather disappointed, but hides it. "You feel better you two?"

We both nod to her, and Katniss thanks them for helping us before they retreat to their own rooms. I do feel a lot better, but a part of me is still strained from the nightmare, a strain that Katniss apparently felt. She sticks her fingers down the front of my pants, and pulls me to my feet, "I know what we need to feel really good." She pulls my pants off of me, and lowers my head to hers, "A shower."

Catnip, you are such a tease.

* * *

She was right, the feeling of the water seems to wash away a lot of the strain from my earlier nightmare. However, she's also playing hard-to-get now, not letting me do more than simply touch her and kiss her. I guess she wants me to redirect my strain and force me to focus on her. Clever girl, cause it's working.

"You're killing me Catnip."

She lasciviously tells me, "That's the point." And then she turns off the shower. "Now come on."

I can't help but follow her lead, cause now I barely even remember what I was feeling earlier. All I want is to lose myself to our own personal reality, where all that exists is the two of us.

When we reach the bed, and she pushes me straight down onto my back, before crawling her way onto me. "Any complaints now, Gale."

I quickly answer, "Fuck no."

She throws her face to mine, taking a nip from my lip. Her teeth travel down my neck, while her hands pin my arms to the bed. I'm more than strong enough to overcome her, but I let her hold me down, letting her have control of me. Her mouth travels to my chest, where she bites and nibbles my nipples, one after the other.

"Jesus Christ, don't stop."

She doesn't, earning her more and more groans from me. She travels further down, her nose tracing the curves of muscles lining my whole torso. She lets go of my arms when she reaches my navel, dipping her tongue into me and sucking the spot periodically. It somewhat tickles. She eventually gets down to the v-shaped lines down at my hips, and uses her hand to stroke me, slow and steady. She traces the lines of my hips as her pace accelerates rapidly, before she takes me into her mouth. She gives me no respite, sucking me hard and fast, swirling her tongue around me. She knows how crazy this is making me, she keeps stopping, refusing to let me go over the edge. At this point, she does have full control, because I can't control myself at all, I can barely muster any strength in my arms. She finally release my throbbing flesh from her mouth, and crawls back up my body.

"You like that Gale?"

My heavy breathing is all the answer she needs. And then she lowers herself onto me, the warmth and the tight feeling alone pushes me over the edge, since I was already there from what she did with her mouth. She refuses to let me recover even for a minute, moving her hips against mine. Her pace was slow and steady, giving me enough of a break to recover from my previous high, and I start to thrust back into her. When she feels this, she increases the pace as I do in response. Eventually, I use my fingers to stimulate her sweet spot, quickly driving her to the edge. She suddenly accelerates to a rapid fire pace, my body unable to move fast enough to keep up with her. One more little touch of her sweet spot, and she goes over the edge, the sudden intense wet constriction forces me to go with her. She collapses against my chest, before rolling on her side, letting me slip from her, leaving me feeling cold and exposed.

Working through her pants, Katniss asks, "Feel better Gale?"

"Never better Catnip."

She lays her head against my shoulder, and relaxes into me as I cuddle her. Exhaustion overcomes us as we fall asleep again, this time hopefully for the rest of the night.

* * *

 _Song credit: Take Me to Church by Hozier_


	9. Please Don't Call Me or My Bluff

**A/N: Don't worry guys, this is a progression chapter. You seemed to like the dark dream in the last chapter. And I have my reasons for making Gale more sensitive than he's made to be in the original trilogy.**

 **Disclaimer: I own nothing, everything here is property of Suzanne Collins.**

* * *

 **Please Don't Call Me or My Bluff**

 _I wake up to feel something warm cuddled up to me, and the sunlight trickling in through window shutters. Except it's too small to be Katniss, and when I look, it's our 7-year-old daughter. I get up slowly to avoid rousing her, and I slip on a sleeveless shirt, and I go downstairs to find Catnip at the kitchen._

 _I wrap my arms around her from behind. "Whatcha making Catnip?"_

 _She simply turns around and asks me, "Is Iridia sleeping?"_

 _I lower my lips to hers, and I pull back, "Yeah, and you know when she sleeps, she doesn't wake up."_

 _I lower my lips back to hers and her hands travel under my shirt and up my back, and the passion of the moment heats up._

 _Katniss retreats insisting we can't, not today. Especially with Iridia in the house, when she's at school it's fine._

 _We got lucky with our family, somehow we managed to get out of the Seam thanks to Prim and Catnip's mother's skills with medical apothecary substances. An apothecary owner allowed us, Prim, and Catnip's mother to have her home when she passed, since she lost her husband and children to an epidemic three years ago. Prim and Catnip's mother became much more spirited, since now we had a nice constant flow of people to help and heal, she's gained a whole new vibrancy. Eventually, Prim and her mother taught us the arts of healing, kind of a necessity, since we were working with them, and that hunting was no longer a necessity. We still did it from time to time to relive our first moments. Prim and her mother found another apothecary to live at and work, so that when we got married, we already have a place of our own. Somehow, we have come full circle from the completely impoverished Seam to the merchant sector. I will say we do look out of place, but it's our home now. We even managed to buy my family a nice home, before my brothers and Posy got old enough to find spouses of their own._

* * *

That was a better dream in my life, a dream I haven't had since all this began. A dream of a beautiful life with the beautiful woman I love, and the children that we could now never have together. I always wanted to have a family, even though Katniss never did. Then again, she never wanted to fall in love, and she did just that with me. If she changed her mind about love, she might have changed her mind about children. Nonetheless, it won't help to fantasize about a future that can never be. Katniss was already awake before me.

"Morning, Catnip."

"Morning, Gale. How you holding up."

"Far better. I think I kind of needed that emotional...I can't even find a word for it. That emotional release I guess you could say."

"Good to know." She suddenly changed the subject, "We showered a few hours ago, should we shower again?"

"Well, we got rather dirty after we showered last night," I said with a nice slur to it.

She laughed at my nice word choice. "Oh my God, Gale."

We got into the shower and came out revitalized…not just because of the shower.

Now we're eating breakfast. Effie and Haymitch still seem concerned about us.

I let them know, "We're okay guys. Thanks to you guys helping us."

Katniss inquires about why they waited to come into the room.

Haymitch answered, "Didn't know if you would appreciate us being in there. Until you wondered out loud why we didn't."

I give a slight chuckle, "Us not appreciating your presence never stopped you before."

He laughs, "Well, there's a first time for everything."

The four of us have a laugh at that as me and Katniss start eating. We're so early that we finish at 9:00. I guess that was partly because we didn't really talk so much.

Effie suddenly cries out, "Well, since we have so much time, Katniss, come come."

Katniss already knows what's in store for her,groaning in complaint, "Really Effie, haven't I already broken those things in."

"Katniss, you can barely make three steps."

"Remind me again why I need to practice."

"For your interview with Caesar tomorrow night."

"Right."

With the women off to Effie's room, Haymitch and I have a discussion of our own.

Haymitch asks me, "What did you guys not do yesterday?"

"Wait what do you mean?"

"What stations didn't you get to?"

"We focused exclusively on survival skills, and hand to hand, figured that we shouldn't even pay any mind to the weapons."

"Good. That's good." He looks down contemplatively before saying, "You should try some of the weapon stations today, but avoid the ones you guys have skill in, archery and knives."

"Are the careers gonna fall for that now? After our fiasco yesterday?"

"Probably. Odds are they'll be blinded by anger and arrogance, though they probably will be more wary than before."

"So we focus on weapons, take note of that."

We discuss a little bit more about our alliance with Rue, discussing the risks of it, until Katniss returns at 9:30 and we go down to training.

* * *

"Catnip what should we do first?"

"We should find Rue first."

I chuckle a little, "If we know her well enough, she'll find us."

She concedes. We first go over to the sword station. According to Katniss, I get the moves down and it looks as if I've been wielding it for my whole life. I highly doubt it.

When Katniss wields the sword that's half her height, she can barely lift it. When I hand her the sword that's proper for her height, she wields it gracefully.

"Well Cat, all we need are swords and we can slice down an entire army of dummies."

The look she gives me is priceless, it is screaming _seriously_.

We then try our hand with axe. We very quickly learn that we have absolutely no coordination with simply swinging regular axes, however, I find with practice, I in particular have some skill with throwing axes in particular. Katniss has some skill with throwing axes as well, though I can tell that neither of us have any natural aptitude with them.

The last weapon we try is the spear. It is clear from the get go that neither of us have any aptitude for it, not even in melee combat. I never notice them, but I think we've done our job in making the careers think we're weak fighters.

We choose to go back to practicing survival skills, though we've already mastered them. More or less, we simply do it to pass time, since we want to follow Haymitch's advice of hiding our strengths. We end up at the fire starting, where we start and extinguish one fire after another. It's when we're here that Rue comes up to us. She asks us to follow her, saying that she wanted us to she what she has going for her. She showed us how she can swiftly move between the trees, to the point where she looks almost like a bird flying between the branches. That's perfect for her. The careers are typically too heavy to climb up trees, and they are also definitely not nimble enough to keep up with her since she's so small. She also showed us how she's a pretty good shot with a slingshot, though I have no idea how useful that could be in the arena. But I guess that everything could have a benefit.

We end up spending lunch simply passing time talking about our homes.

Rue mentions, "Back home, I'm the only one who can reach the highest branches."

"Even Catnip can't reach the highest branches."

She looks at me confused, and I realize that I called Katniss by my personal nickname for her.

"When I met her, and I asked for her name. She whispered so lowly that I didn't fully hear her. I thought she said Catnip and I pitied her for a bit."

The next thing I feel is Katniss slapping me across the back of my head.

Rue laughs and I exaggeratingly yell, "Hey!"

We spend the rest of lunch simply making upbeat conversations, trying to make light of where we are.

Rue followed us to our next stations, and stuck with me when Katniss split off to archery. I decide to try my hand at throwing knives. Haymitch told us to display our strengths, so we won't, we'll pretend that we suck at them.

First I start out with a still target, getting a feel for the different weight of the knives, and get used to the feel of throwing again. I don't aim for the heart, instead I aim to a spot I chose away from it. Eventually, I get a hang for the knives, but I still maintain the façade that I'm mediocre with them.

Rue sees through the façade, and with a smile says, "You are _horrible_ with those."

I glance at her and return her little smile. "You wanna try?"

She decides to give it a shot, but she's not good at it. At all. That and she's dramatically shorter than the dummy targets, meaning she has to aim upwards anyway.

After she finishes, I go again. I keep going until I hear Rue quietly call for me.

"What?"

She points somewhere, "Over there."

I follow her finger, to the archery station. I see someone over there, a guy who looks like he's wielding the bow. Except he's not, I can see that he's wrapped himself around someone else. I swear it looks like Marvel, and I know that Katniss went there, but did she leave? I look to Rue wondering what she saw exactly. "Is that...is he wrapped around Katniss?"

She nods, "It looks like the boy from 1, he's all on her."

I see nothing but red. He better be ready to lose his hands and his eyes. I start charging over to the archery station with Rue following me.

"Where do you think you're going loverboy?"

It's Cato, coming at me with a vengeful look on his face.

"Rue, get back."

"Thought it was funny making fun of us yesterday, bitch?!"

And then he throws a punch, one that I easily block away from me. Before he has a chance to throw another, I knee him in his ribcage, and then I give him a right hook, causing him to stumble away from me. The fury in his eyes is intense, and he tries at me again with an alpha male's bloodlust. He tries to punch me again, and I use my technique I got from hand to hand training to twist myself behind him. I hold his hands in mine, bringing both my arms to his head, and then bend forward, sending him flying over my shoulder, right onto his chest. He gets up and tries to charge at me again, to which I simply arrange myself to his side, grabbing hold of him again, flipping him onto his back, knocking the breath out of him.

"Yeah Cato. It was funny." This must have happened very quickly, or the peacekeepers aren't doing their job, because no one came to stop us. I turn to go to Katniss, but as it turns out, she handled herself well. All I see is Marvel on his back with Katniss pinning him down with her foot on his neck. She is an amazing girl. When she looks up at me, she flashes me a nice smirk. Did she notice Cato on the floor behind me? Suddenly, I remember Rue was nearby for this, I turn and I don't find her anywhere. Good. She probably left to find Thresh.

Finally, I hear the peacekeepers scurrying to stop the violence that already ended. They take me by the arm and take me away. I saw them do the same with Katniss. I admit it's satisfying to turn back and see Cato still writhing on the ground trying to catch his breath. I wonder how the career girls reacted to this.

The peacekeepers bring us to the elevators, and tell us not to return for the day. The moment the elevator doors close, me and Katniss look at one another, still exhilarated from the prior events, and we throw ourselves onto one another. The feeling is like 2 cyclones coming together, coalescing into a storm of cosmic proportions. We, or at least I, get enough concentration to focus on the elevator doors when they open. It looks like it's empty, good for us.

I carry Katniss to the closest room, hers, and throw her down on the bed, where we're transported to our own world for the time. At least until someone walks in on us when they find out about the incident.

* * *

 _Song credit: Bitch Better Have My Money by Rihanna_


	10. Feel the Earth Move

**A/N: The Games will begin soon, hang in there. This is more of a placeholder, since I couldn't fit it anywhere else. After this chapter, updates will occur more slowly.**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own The Hunger Games.**

* * *

 **Feel the Earth Move**

We got lucky today, because Effie walked in after me and Katniss were able to get dressed. We figured we wouldn't play hard to get, and waited for her in the living room, where she made it very clearly was gonna reprimand us.

Effie first yells, "Are you two completely insane?! You know that fighting with the other tributes is strictly forbidden."

I responded, "So you wanted me to let Cato jump me?"

Katniss, almost simultaneously responded, "You wanted me to let Marvel grope me?"

"That's what the peacekeepers are for. You realize your actions reactions reflect badly on all of us who are part of 12, not just you!"

Out of nowhere, I hear Cinna's voice, "They just want a good show. They made it clear that there probably will be." He walks in from the direction of the elevators, must have come up with Effie.

"How about it's just bad manners Cinna, how about that?"

Portia, who's with Cinna, interjects, "Calm down, Effie. What are they gonna do about it down there? That they haven't already done?"

Effie's left unable to find words at that. She simply winces and starts pacing around. As nice as she is, she can sometimes be a bit irrational.

In the meantime Cinna and Portia sit on either side of the two of us. But before they could say or do anything, Effie walks off saying, "Well it's about time." She walks right back with Haymitch casually striding behind her, "I hope you realize, we have a serious situation."

Not surprisingly, Haymitch doesn't say anything, but gives us a thumbs up and a gleeful smile. "Nice job sweethearts."

Effie at this point completely surrenders, and just collapses against an empty chair, holding her face.

"Now, don't hide anything, I know some of what happened, but I wanna know what actually happened."

Katniss immediately starts, "I was practicing at the archery station and pretending to struggle. I was really only trying to get a feel for the metal bow."

I'm looking at her with curiosity because I don't even know what happened.

"I aimed for spots outside the dummy. Apparently, Marvel, from 1, though it would be funny to try to do something. He saw that Gale wasn't with me, and he began to touch me, inappropriately."

I immediately see red, and my reaction is clearly visible even though I don't do anything. "Inappropriately? Euphemism of the year. Would assault be much?"

Katniss holds my hand, and looks at me in a comforting manner. "He wrapped one arm around my waist, his free hand traveling up my body, telling me how much fun it would be once he got his hands on me in the arena." She smiles a bit, "I showed him what would happen by simply swinging my foot to his nuts, uppercutting him by the chin, and then throwing him to the ground with the moves I learned in hand to hand."

Me and Haymitch say in unison, "Well deserved."

She finishes, "And to answer you Gale, that does qualify as an assault on me."

Before Haymitch has a chance to ask, I start with my half. "I was throwing knives, pretending to fail, same as her. Rue was with me, and she was the one who noticed what Marvel was doing." I notice that even Effie is looking and listening too. "It was a planned encounter, because the moment I started charging over to her, Cato came at me like a bear. He tried to get the drop on me, but it didn't work. It was satisfying to see him writhing on the ground trying to catch his breath after I threw him on his back."

Haymitch at this point is completely psychotically gleeful. "I can't believe this. Nobody does that to a career. Nobody. Especially twice. I absolutely love it."

I think I sort of kill the mood when I say, "Hope the gamemakers do too."

Haymitch proves me wrong, "Gale. You guys are fine. The gamemakers love it when they can see that a good show is upcoming, as do sponsors. And if you ask me, it looks like you fit what they think brings a good show."

Haymitch's words make me relax a little bit, knowing that our skirmishes with the careers aren't condemning us to fight solely on our own. I look at Effie, who seems a bit more relaxed at everything. "You alright Effie?"

"I've been better, but at least now I understand what actually happened. When words travel, they lose the truth."

Katniss asks her, "What do you mean?"

"When I heard about what happened, they said, outright, that you attacked the career boys. At least now I know that wasn't the case, that and you had very good reason for it."

Catnip and I flesh smiles at one another. Effie also seems to be a bit more receptive to the situation. She changed the topic, "We should discuss the interviews, which happen the night of the private sessions, two days from now."

Cinna explains, "The interviews are the final chance either of you will get to leave an impact on the audience and sponsors before the games begin."

Portia comes in, "We already have your outfits ready. Everyone's been referring to Katniss as the girl on fire, so your outfits are flame-themed," She glances and flashes a small smile, "and we added a little bonus for the fact that you're an item."

I would ask what that would be, but I have enough common sense that bonus meant surprise as well.

"And this will be the only time I condone undermining the other tributes," Effie says, much to our surprise, even Haymitch's. "What?"

I remark, "Effie. You are full of surprises."

She tilts her head, and flashes a teeth-showing humorous smile.

Haymitch begins explaining what the interviews consist of. "I don't think I have to spell it out, but you can guarantee that for Katniss, Caesar will mention your sister, and for both of you will probably bring up your relationship. Use that to your advantage, because sponsors, as I've said many times, will probably love the star-crossed lover of District 12."

I'm still by no means happy, at all with using our relationship as a tool, but I guess not harm will be done to anyone, not even us. Apparently my face betrays my thoughts, because Haymitch looks at me piteously.

Effie come see back in. "Technically, were not supposed to know what goes on in training. But word spreads about it pretty easily. Odds are you two will be asked about your scuffle with the careers. I have no clue how to help you answer to that."

Haymitch interjects, "I know a perfect way." He gives a slight pause. "Just be yourself in your answer. People often like it when people are themselves. I was for mine, and it worked out perfectly."

I'm too young to have seen it, but now I wanna watch his interview. Though, I'm not willing to see his plight, cause even if the moments are light, it doesn't eliminate the dark circumstances.

* * *

I'm alone with my thoughts for the first time on the roof. The conversation continued for what felt like hours, to the point where the sun was setting by the time we stopped when we ran out of things to talk about. I excused myself to go to the roof, I felt the need to contemplate things on my own. I'm still not pleased with using our relationship as a tool, it makes me feel that it defeats the purpose of having a meaningful relationship.

I start out by simply letting the thoughts come into my head, though it's really difficult for me, because I don't have an outsider to help me make sense of what I'm thinking. Maybe that's a good thing for me. Maybe it's better if I make sense of things myself instead of having someone do it for me. I thought too soon, because I feel a pair of soft, small hands wrap around me from behind.

"Hey, Catnip."

"Wanna talk?"

"Yeah, I kinda need to."

She pulls me with her and we sit under one of the trees, "What's on your mind?"

"I'm in pain. To say the least." Understatement of the year. "Particularly because I don't like using our relationship as a tool."

"Gale, look at me." She grabs me by my face, and forces me to look her in the eyes. "No matter what happens, nothing will ever change what we have."

"Are we both sure about that?" She gives me a semi-conceding look. "And it's not just about our relationship as a tool, I kinda lied. It's more. That I don't want, what happens in the next two week to change us."

Katniss fully concedes to my logic, knowing that I'm right about that being a possibility. "You mean that, if one of us makes it out alive. You want us, to be the people we were. You don't want either of us to lose ourselves."

"Precisely, Catnip."

She stands up, "I can't tell you that what happens in the next two weeks will or won't change us. But you know what I can tell you?"

I look at her, and I shake my head, wondering what she's getting at.

"Dinner's ready."

I lightly laugh, "Cute subject change. You should do it more often." I get up and follow her downstairs.

Dinner is uneventful and quiet, until Effie decides to confess something to us. "I have something I want to tell you two."

With the sudden break in silence, we quickly divert our attention to her.

"My original opinion of 12, I'm sure you know, was extremely poor. But…after seeing you two at the reaping, and these last few days, I realize how wrong I was."

She's right, most of us had enough common sense to know her probable opinion of us from 12.

"I don't think any other district could've gotten to me like you have. My promises, may mean little, but I swear to stay with 12, and help them become as strong as you for the rest of my life."

I feel moved once again at Effie's words, she's such a sweet person. Most Capitol citizens are rather stuck up, but she's different. "Effie, I think I can say the same thing about you. I used to think of the Capitol citizens as dim witted, unable to see bigger pictures. You proved me wrong about that."

Katniss comes in, "Me too."

Haymitch says, "Me three."

We share a laugh at Haymitch's cute spot of humor. Effie's ultimate goal is to lighten the atmosphere when people are down, and she does so in the ways she knows best. This time it works well, and the last time worked well too. It's still a little somber, but at least now a little lighter than it was beforehand.

With the conversation over, we simply finish our dinner, before retreating to Katniss's room, where she began removing layers of my clothing as well as her own, before she pulled me into the shower. The fire between us here is much more simmering than it is engulfing. She pulls my body to the front of hers. My hand travels to her signature braid, where I slowly loosen my handiwork, letting the soaked gorgeous silky curtain fall behind her, like that of a siren. She pulls my face down to hers, forcing us to breathe the same air, before I lock my lips with hers. I reach behind her to change the spray to our favorite, lavender-scented soap spray. The scent reminds me of a meadow, a flower garden. It makes us feel as if we're laying in a clearing in the woods, with a carpet of flowers around us. The warmth between us feels like that of the sun. The scent makes us feel as if we're in a personal paradise, where we can have a small but perfect piece of our forever.

We get out of the shower, the water doing nothing to cool either of us. We don't bother with a dryer or a towel, I simply carry Katniss to her bed, collapsing with her on her back. I break away enough to tell her I love her, a confession she reciprocates. Right after our shared proclamation, I enter in full force. And the rest of the night is lost between us.

* * *

 _Song credit: Skyfall by Adele_


	11. I See Myself in You

**A/N: This one will be on the shorter side, just like the last one. Lemons on the way.**

 **Disclaimer: The Hunger Games is all property of Suzanne Collins.**

* * *

 **I See Myself in You**

This morning, I wake up earlier than normal. I wake up on my own, without the alarm clock sounding off. I look at the clock and see that it's not even 7 yet. I return to spooning Katniss, at least I can have the illusion that I'm relaxing well into the day. In the meantime, I start contemplating things, especially with what's going to happen down below in training today, if the careers are gonna leave us be until the arena. But I don't contemplate for long, eventually, I simply think of my and Katniss's families. I wonder about their well-being, I hope the Mellarks are taking care of them as they had promised. If they're not, then anything we do here is in vain. I have to hope that they're ok, all of them. Mom, Vick, Rory, Posy, Prim and Katniss's mother.

Either she was already awake, or me cuddling against her woke her, because Katniss stirs and turns around to face me. "Hey, Gale."

"Hey, Catnip."

"Penny for my boyfriend's thoughts?"

Cute, Catnip. "Thinking of everyone back home. Our families. I'm hoping…I'm hoping that the Mellarks are holding up to what they said."

She props herself on her elbow, "You're the one who always reminds me that Mr. Mellark always had feelings for my mother. He has reason. I believe, truly, that they're being taken care of."

"Catnip, how are you so upbeat and hopeful right now?"

Her face drops somewhat, "Whoever said that I am?"

I sit up, and simply sigh, my hands covering my face, the strain of the approaching start of the next Hunger Games. The days pass so fast, yet so slow. The sole thing I want right now is not feel this. I get some relief when Catnip's hands go up and down my back, relieving some of the tension in my muscles. "Thanks."

She doesn't respond with words. She simply pulls me back to lie with her, and sits astride me. "We both know what works even better."

I give a smile and I surrender. She pulls me by my hair up to her, closing the distance between us. My mouth travels the length of her neck, to her shoulder, where I softly bite and suck on her soft skin. She shudders at the feeling of my mouth on her. I lift her up slowly, and she aligns me with her, before I lower ear back onto me much more fiercely than when I lifted her, the sharp gasp she makes spurring me on in my blind lust.

It spurs me on enough for me to flip us over, me taking full control, pinning her arms down. I set a slow pace, but with sharp movements. I inevitably start losing my composure and control of myself, and I let Catnip's arms go. Her hands travel around my rib cage to my sweaty back, where she traces the ridge of my spine with her nails. She starts digging much harder into my back, forcing me to move faster. Her teeth travel across my neck, to my shoulders, the same mine did for her. She bites with much more force than I did. She loves to tear at me the same I do for her, I guess we're both predators, even to one another. I feel that she's close to her peak, as am I. Her climax hits, forcing me to go with her into a peaceful world where only we exist, a world that lasts only for a moment before fading away. I roll to the side, trying to avoid crush Catnip beneath me, and she wraps her arm around my chest, kissing my neck as we recover.

"Feel better, Gale?"

"A bit." I turn to her and smile, before wrapping my arms around her, pulling her into the warmth of my body. And then the fucking alarm clock goes off. I turn it off, though what I want to do is break it. Luckily, we still got two hours before we have to be down, more than enough time.

We finally crawled out of bed at 9, and managed to finish breakfast ten minutes before training began. However, both of us were not actually concerned about making it on time, just following the orders of Haymitch and Effie, so that "we get all the training we can." When we got to training, Atala came up to us, saying that we were not allowed to go to the same station as the careers, and they wouldn't be allowed to do the same with us. She also told us in a nonchalant voice that we were not permitted to fight the other tributes.

We ended up spending not a lot of time at the stations, so much as the strength courses around the center, such as the gauntlet and the ropes course. I found the agility needed for the gauntlet daunting, and I could barely do it, unlike Katniss who with her smaller body could move more swiftly than I could. Climbing up the rope net was different, rather easy for me, despite my weight. Katniss didn't even attempt it, she called herself a tree-climber, not a rope-climber. After this, we simply went back to survival skills, until lunch began and that's where we are now.

Rue comes over to the table with us.

"I didn't want to mention it before. But I saw your reaping."

The memory does make my face fall a bit, but I reassure her it's nothing to be afraid to mention.

"It's fine Rue," Katniss adds.

Rue smiles. "I was shocked when I saw your sister being reaped, so were we, including Thresh and our mentors. They, and myself, we were moved by your volunteering, Katniss."

Cat gives a small smile.

"I will also say that, I cried after seeing what happened, right after Gale's name was called."

I grab her hand, and look at her. "I think a lot of people did."

She leans in, "Everyone here is afraid of you two as much as the careers, if not more."

I am a bit flabbergasted at that declaration, "What? Why?"

"Rumor has it that the sponsors love you two."

I guess Haymitch was right about our relationship having that effect. I look at Katniss, and she looks at me, making it clear that she's thinking the same thing. We're both at a loss for words, and Rue herself is silent, likely waiting for us to say something.

I finally mutter quietly, "I...I don't know what to say at that."

Rue leans in and tells us, "A lot of people want to try and do something to take you out of the picture quickly."

Katniss snidely remarks, "No surprise."

I thank Rue for letting us know about this, an expression of gratitude that she claimed wasn't necessary. "Is there anyone in here who _doesn't_ wanna kill us now?" I'm thinking that we're not feared because we can harm them, but because we can outlast them because of outside help we're pretty much guaranteed to have. Though, guarantee is maybe a stretch.

Rue simply shrugs. Not surprising. If we're basically the sponsor darlings, everyone will want to take us out first to prevent us from becoming any kind threat. The careers have more personal reasons.

She stays with us throughout training. We return to some of her strong suits. She shows us how she can identify all types of plants. It seems on par with the skills of the girl from 5. It's a perfect combination of skills for her, swift motions in trees, lightweight speed, and plant identification. It's a perfect survivalist skill set, and a perfect one for her to avoid the other tributes. You know, I actually do genuinely believe that she may have a chance at this. If she can get the sponsors on her side, she may very well stand a chance emerging as the victor, the youngest if she did. The youngest was a 14-year-old. Part of me hopes that she does, but at the same time, I alost hope that it's not left to me or Katniss and Rue in the arena, because I could never harm such an innocent young girl. I know for a fact Katniss never could, because I can easily tell that Rue reminds her of Prim.

* * *

Finally the last day of training is over. We are released to our floor, and I'm ready to clean off the sweat and stress from the last day with a nice warm shower. Katniss is as eager as I am for that.

The warm shower water running down my skin offers a satisfying relief from the strain of the day, physical and mental. It also effectively washes reality from around me and Katniss. I lift her up and fiercely press her back against the wall, making her grunt.

In a seductive and lascivious voice, "Careful Gale. Wouldn't want me to break so soon."

I raise my mouth to her ear, whispering, "Then don't fight."

"Maybe I can't fight, but I _can_ do this." She reaches her arms behind me and drags her now longer nails up and down my back. Whether or not she draws blood, I don't know or care. I love the pain, and she knows it.

I dive my own lips and teeth onto her neck, sucking hard and long, wanting to leave marks on her. I want her and everyone else to know that she's mine, and only mine. Her nails dig even harder into my back, but it no longer hurts at all. The only thing I feel is her body cradling me when I enter her at maximum force.

My lips return to hers as I move, rapidly, fiercely, animalistically. There's no gentle touching, no caressing, all simple aggression. Last time was much more savory, much more calm. This time, we simply give in to our hunter's desire. Not the desire to hunt and kill prey, but to attack one another, sexually and ferociously.

I thrust into her as hard as I can, going in deep and unrelenting. I keep stopping from one time to another, trying to keep us from going over the edge too soon. However, she picks up on my pattern, and returns with downward thrusts as well. This forces both of us over the edge almost as quickly as we started, leaving us as boneless heaps as we slide to the shower floor.

"Catnip?"

She opens her eyes and looks at me.

"I love you."

"Gale. I love you."

She lowers her face down on mine for one last lingering kiss, before we get out of the shower to get dressed. We can't get enough of one another, with both of us now living on borrowed time. All we want is one another, and at the least only one of us comes out. The other option is both of us never leaving the arena.

At dinner, Haymitch speaks to us about the importance of tomorrow. "It's your private sessions with the gamemakers."

He explains everything, going up the districts starting with one, so we'll be last, no surprise. "Whatever you got in store that you didn't already show the gamemakers in training, now's the time to show it off. You both seem to share many of the same skills, so show em off as much as you can. Just, make sure they remember you."

Katniss quietly remarks, "I think we already got that taken care of."

Effie interjects, "Well, then that should be easy."

She also begins explaining more about the interview. "For the interview, you two will also be last. You'll sit in a set of chairs around the Caesar, and be called up one at a time, ladies first. Caesar will ask you about various things, things that if you give the right response, you leave a significant impact. For both of you, that will definitely be the reaping, for you Katniss, he'll likely mention your sister. For you Gale, he'll likely ask you about your relationship with each other. Each one lasts roughly five, and he'll let you off. Your ultimate goal is to make a lasting impression, and that's where being last is best, because everyone remembers the first and the last."

Her words have quite an impact on me. They're quite inspiring, and I'm surprised that she actually cares about us. If I knew people well enough, no one really gives any damns about us from 12.

Cinna and Portia come in with their half of the job for the interview.

Maybe me and Katniss really stand a chance of winning this.

That's what I'm thinking when I fall asleep spooning Catnip.

* * *

 _Song credit: Show 'em What You're Made Of by the Backstreet Boys_


	12. Not Backing Down

**A/N: The games are almost here.**

 **Disclaimer: I own nothing.**

* * *

 **Not Backing Down**

"..."

I just groan at the sound I just heard. I'm too tired to deal with this right now.

"...Hey..."

I still don't rouse from my semi conscious state. Whatever I'm hearing then starts hitting me with something soft. When I finally completely awaken, I can barely make out that it's Portia. I'm not feeling as invaded as I normally would, maybe because I know her well, maybe her gender, or maybe because she's already seen me when I was completely nude. Nonetheless, as internally upset I am, I try not to let it show.

"Hey Portia. What time is it?"

"8 in the morning." There's an undercurrent of apology in her voice. "I turned both your alarms off yesterday, though you might've needed the extra rest. The two of you need to get ready for your private sessions, which are in an hour."

Katniss is still asleep next to me. "I'll get her up, we'll be on time."

She turns to leave, "Good."

"Wait, Portia."

She turns to me.

"Can I talk to you alone before we go to the sessions?"

She nods, "Of course."

With her out of the room, I turn my attention to Katniss. I simply turn her so I can pick her up, and I carry her to the bathroom. I want to have a little fun, so I place her in the shower. Neither of us are clothed, so this is easy. I find a button that turns on ice cold water. The gurgling scream she gives is absolutely hilarious.

She's struggling to even stand. She groggily manages to croak, "Damn you, Gale."

When she finally gains enough energy to stand and turn the shower off, she glares daggers at me. I'm still laughing. "Cat, you made that so easy."

She tries to charge at me, but she barely has enough coordination to step over the edge of the shower, and she trips and slips right into my arms. She's freezing, but I don't pay any mind to it. "I. Am. Gonna. Fucking. Kill. You."

I still tease her, "Good luck."

I push her and myself back into the shower, and this time turn on warm water. "What time is it?"

"It's early. Portia woke me up."

Katniss, still groggy, leans into me. "Today's. The last day?"

I don't answer, she and I already know the answer to that question. The atmosphere becomes much more somber at that point. We don't talk for the rest of our shower. Mostly because we can't with our lips in constant contact. Nothing too crazy happens, unlike what has happened for the past three days. Today's far tamer than the last few days have been.

* * *

Breakfast was as monotonous as ever. Haymitch reminded us of everything we needed to know about the private sessions, again. Even he seemed annoyed, but felt he had to do it.

After breakfast, I went to the roof, saying I wanted to be alone for a moment, though really, I'm actually waiting for Portia.

"Gale?"

"Hey. Thanks for coming up."

"No problem, what do you need?"

I'm ever so grateful to have Portia, Cinna, Effie, and even Haymitch here. Had it not been for them, our stay here before what would be our last two weeks alive would've been dramatically worse and maybe dreary. The four of them made me, and I hope Katniss, feel rather content, since they treated us as humans, not just dirt from 12. "I need you to get me something for me, before the interviews."

"What?"

"A ring, that looks like it's from home."

"As your token?"

"I didn't bring anything with me from home, I was kinda busy."

Portia comes to me, placing her hand on my shoulder. "Of course I can. And that reminds me, does Katniss have a token of her own?"

I'm just about to say no, when I remember that she has the mockingjay pin I got for her on her birthday. "Yes. A gift I gave her for her birthday."

"Very good, Gale. I already have something in mind in for you."

"I can't wait to see what you in your infinite creativity will get."

Portia gestures for me to go with her. She brings me down to the elevator, on the way giving me some words of inspiration to help me get through the next few hours.

* * *

God almighty, the one thing I wish Haymitch warned us about was how much waiting for this eats away at your mind. Us being last makes all the tension build and build as we see the room slowly empty. So far, only the careers have taken up a long time, all 15 minutes. The others typically are taking 7-10 minutes. Women are going first, leaving me the very last one. When Rue's turn came, she took longer than most of the others, giving me the idea that she impressed the gamemakers enough that they waited for her to finish. Thresh took a long time as well. He's so strong that I wasn't surprised, he's probably showing off any abilities he has, since he almost literally didn't do anything with the other tributes.

Now it's Katniss's turn. Right after they call her up for her session, she gets up hesitatingly. I look at her, and I tell her, "You'll do fine Catnip."

She looked back at me, and seemed to relax slightly. She simply nods, then walks off to her session. I sit there alone for the first time in hours, and I feel exhausted. I guess doing nothing is as taxing on your mind as having too much to do. I can only focus on Katniss right now, thinking about how she's doing. I hope she uses the snares I taught her, and I hope that she doesn't lose her concentration with the bow. This keeps echoing in my head for every second, and every second feels like several minutes. Unlike everyone else, I don't realize and take estimate of how much time she's been in there. Finally, she comes back in and leaves, I don't know how much time she spent in there, so I have no clue as to what her score could end up being, based solely on her time.

 _Gale Hawthorne._

This is it. This is my last chance. Okay, I have knife-throwing, some arching skills, and I can set up a fatal trap that hangs the victim by their neck. I slowly walk inside, expecting the gamemakers to be overly bored with everything, the monotony of the tributes coming in and out. However, I was dead wrong, because they all seem to focus on me in an instant. Maybe the scuffle with the careers endeared us to them. Ironic. But regardless, I can't back down, I have to go forth, and I must do my best, it's my only chance.

I start where I'm most comfortable, the snare-setting. I quickly set up two traps, one that pig-snares the victim, the other that hangs the victim fatally. I decide to spice it up and take a few knives with me for a little show. I throw a single dummy onto the pig-snare trap. As the dummy spins and swings chaotically, I take a leap of faith in my knife-throwing abilities, and throw one. Even to my surprise, I hit the dummy in the dark red circle marking its heart. I saved the best trap for last, and when I throw the dummy onto the death trap, it works perfectly, hanging the dummy by its neck. I turn around to the gamemakers, and I see a lot of them looking at that in awe, maybe nobody's seen a trap like that before. The next thing I do is head to the bow and arrow. I take a bow proper to my size and a full quiver, and get a feel for its draw weight, and a feel for it in general. The set up is different now, similar to the knife throwing, with light up dummy targets. After prepping myself, I start the test. Only one chance.

I switch to automatic pilot, and program myself to simply respond, draw, shoot, get another arrow. It feels like the test ends as quickly as it started, and I look at the dummies, and I see that I hit only one in the dead red, the rest just in the chest area, where it would still be fatal without treatment. I look at the gamemakers, who to my surprise, seem impressed at the sight before them.

I finally do the knife-throwing test. I use the same tactic that I used with archery, moving myself to autopilot, letting muscle memory take over. This one was far better than my arching, with each knife thrown swiftly striking each dummy's heart. When the test is over, I see every dummy with a knife protruding from the darkest red. With the last of my unseen skills displayed, I turn to the obviously pleased gamemakers, and give a slight bow, before they dismiss me. They all seem to be happy with what they saw, but I don't feel like I did good at all.

* * *

I still feel like I'm running on autopilot when I return to the floor, I'm still running on my impulses. My instinct is telling me to find Katniss, and I find her in her room, lying down on the bed. I first see the clock, and it says it's almost 3 in the afternoon, to my surprise, I thought far more time passed. When Katniss sees me, she immediately gets up and comes over to me, and her words snap me out of my feeling of being on automatic mode.

"How do you think you did?"

"I don't know," I'm not lying, I'm definitely not certain about what they thought of me.

"Gale, don't leave me hanging, what did you do?"

When I told her the things I did in the time I had, she looked rather stunned. I guess I keep undermining my own skills. Maybe it's better that way.

"What about you, Catnip?"

She used something similar to what I did, using a snare trap designed to hang someone by the ankle, and then using the bow she had to shoot it in its heart. She then did the same archery test I did, with far more success, hitting each dummy in the heart, and one even in the head. Doesn't surprise me, she's the best shot I've ever seen in my life. That was all she did.

Both of us seemed inspired by one another's performances for the gamemakers. If they really liked us over these last four days, then we'll find out in less than two hours. I'm dreading the scores, especially because they could mean so many things either for or against us. If it's low, they may be dangerous predators waiting for us to let our guard down. If it's high, we know they're a legitimate threat. But no matter the reason for a score being low, if ours are, we're on our own, and we better be lucky if we're gonna survive this.

Portia comes into the room, telling us that the others want to know what happened in our sessions.

Effie seems enthusiastic and ecstatic, to say the least. Haymitch, always the more reserved of the group, simply smiles and compliments us. Cinna and Portia are elated. Everyone's excited for the scores, saying that the gamemakers and citizens already love the two of us. If the rumors ring true, we should be set with sponsors, especially if our scores are high.

Suspense is at its highest when the anthem plays on the holographic television. It ends with Caesar appearing, explaining how the score display will occur. He'll name the district, and its tributes, who will appear on either side of him. The score will materialize beneath each respective tribute.

District 1 of course has pretty high scores, Marvel has a 9, and the girl, who he names as Glimmer has an 8. No surprise that she got a comparably mediocre score since she's worthless with a bow. District 2, Cato and Clove both have a 10. I don't pay much mind to District 3, maybe Catnip is. District 4's boy got an 8, so he may be one to watch. The girl from 5, who he fittingly lists as Foxface, got a 5. Once again, she makes it impossible to get a read on her, smart move on her part. I don't pay much mind to the rest of the tributes until we get to 11. Rue got a 7, good for her, she stands at least some kind of a chance. Guess the gamemakers found value in how she could move between trees like a bird. Thresh has a 9, probably for his sheer strength, he stands a chance too.

Finally it's our turn. Katniss is on Caesar's left, I'm on his right. Our images are there for what feels like forever before the numbers finally appear. I expected nothing greater than 8, at least for me. Nobody says anything when the numbers appear on the screen, 11. Both of them. Are 11s. I couldn't believe it, I thought I barely did good, let alone material to outdo the careers's scores. Katniss, I'm not surprise. Everyone in the room erupts in laughter and cheers, even the reserved Haymitch lets out a small cry of happiness. Even Caesar seems amazed by the score.

Haymitch says, "They must have liked your guts. No one, and I mean, no one stands up a career unless they have a death wish."

Effie immediately stands up, her jaw almost hitting the floor. Cinna sits up and proposes a toast to us. "To Katniss and Gale, the couple on fire!" I personally like that little moniker for us.

Portia stands next to Cinna, and they communicate nonverbally. She turns to me and Katniss and tells us, "Me and Cinna are gonna go get your outfits, go and get showered up, in _your own_ showers, please."

* * *

 _Song credit: Girl on Fire by Alicia Keys_


	13. Shine Bright

**A/N: This one's long. One more chapter, and then we're at the Games.**

 **Disclaimer: I own nothing.**

* * *

 **Shine Bright**

When I exit my long lonely shower, I find my outfit on the bed. It's a suit, mostly black covered in bright orange flame accents. There's a small box next to it. The box has a black ring, it's ridged and jagged, like the coal from our district.

The suit's tailored very nicely to me, and soft and feels smooth. The flames on the suit appear to shimmer as I move in the mirror. When I open the door, I find my entire prep team outside waiting for me, Portia included. She immediately glances to my hands, looking for her gift, and smiles when I show it to her on my left ring finger.

All of them push into my room, opening the suit jacket, and shifting everything to make sure it's properly arranged. They also particularly focus on my head, mixing various products in my hair, and examining my face for any blemishes and imperfections. The only thing they do is take a pair of tweezers and fix my eyebrows up a bit. They also put something that looks like makeup on me, but because it's in my face, I can't see what it's doing. Glancing in the mirror, I see that it's simply making my face shimmer lightly glow. I have to admit, I kind of like it.

Once they're done messing with my face, they bring me outside, where finally I catch a glimpse of Katniss. She's always beautiful, but the outfit she's wearing makes her a siren tonight. Her dress doesn't cover her shoulders, and reaches down to her knees, and sparkling like gems in the same color as my flaming accents. Her gorgeous hair is pinned up in a semi messy bun. The makeup on her face is far from too much, it makes her face shine brilliantly. She's the very definition of what true beauty is. I barely notice that she's also staring at me like I'm a sex object. I kind of am, just that I'm only hers.

Portia stands in front of me to get my attention, and laughs as she says, "You guys have the rest of tonight for that. Right now we have something very important to do." Cinna who's next to Katniss giggles at that.

I still don't take my eyes off Katniss, until she turns away, heading for the elevator. She's walking in her shoes pretty nicely, thanks to Effie.

* * *

We're down in the area where we get our last minute touch ups and advice from our stylists. Portia's right now making sure that the outfit is perfectly arranged, nothing beats doing something yourself.

She asks me, "You like the ring?"

"Yes. I like what you did with it." She smiles and keeps checking my outfit. I start wondering about how things will be, especially when the games begin. Everyone is given odds, but this is a serious life and death situation, because 23 people must lose for 1 to win. That means, that one of us will have to give up the other in order to make it out, but neither me nor Katniss could ever bear that on our consciences. I know I'd rather not live than live without her, and I know (in truth I more hope) she feels the same way.

I get too caught up in my thoughts to realize that Portia was talking me. "Hey, you paying attention?"

Her words snap me back. "Oh, sorry."

She gives me a _really?_ face. "Fine. I was saying, I have something I need you to put on." She pulls out a small, pink circle thing. It almost looks like a piece of a tongue. "You have French kissed Katniss before, right?"

"Yes." I don't feel like that's a major thing to reveal, why does it matter?

"Good, open your mouth."

"Why?"

"A surprise." Goes to figure, whatever's gonna happen, it won't be something that we know. If I know Portia and Cinna well enough, it's something that deals with flames. I'm looking forward to seeing it myself. "Katniss has hers, Cinna gave it to her in the penthouse. You won't even feel it."

I hesitatingly open my mouth, and all I feel is the pressure from her placing the circle on the tip of my tongue. When her hand is out, I realize that I don't feel the circle just like she said. "I just have to kiss her?"

"Yes. Save it for the right time. Now, let's get you out to the others."

She takes me to the waiting area, everyone is scattered with their respective prep teams. Me and Portia head over to where we see Katniss and the others.

Cinna asks Portia, "You gave him his sensor?"

I'm the one who tells him yes. He smiles, and so does Katniss.

Haymitch comes in with a few last words. "Roughly five minutes with him, he'll give you an intro and it'll be obvious when lets you go. Make an impression, again."

Katniss and I thank him for this, for everything he's done for us over the past week. Knowing him, that was rather surprising. The same can be said for Effie. Given how stuck up she seemed when we met, we never would've believed she'd be so helpful with us. Speaking of her, when I see her, she's looking somewhere, the look in her face not very happy. Following her eyes, of course I find the careers, this time the four from 1 and 2 of them glaring daggers at us. Looks like we may outshine them yet again. Instead of being intimidated, I intend to show them that I will not back down to them, and I just smile. I smile at them to get under their skin, and it works.

Before anything could escalate, someone calls all the tributes to order, telling us to get with our District partner and arrange in order from 1 to 12. They then file us out to wait before the stage, and have each district come out one at a time to sit down on their chairs. We're sitting in an elevated semicircle above Caesar and the second chair where we will be interviewed. The female sits on the right chair, males on the left. When we all are seated, the show begins.

A spotlight shines over Caesar and the interviewee's chair. He gives an introductory speech, trying to energize the crowd. I'm hardly giving any mind to it, I'm only concentrating on Katniss, I know that she doesn't deal too well with this type of thing.

I grab her hand, and mouth to her, "It's okay."

She simply smiles, and then kisses me, without tongue. Apparently, the crowd was paying attention to us, because I heard the amount of whistling and catcalling from the audience. skyrocket. I see that Caesar is smiling at us, and the crowd is practically worshiping us. We give a little wave to the crowd. I don't dare to look at the careers, nothing will ruin the moment between me and Katniss and the crowd. But I'm willing to bet that they're scowling at us right now.

I mouth to Katniss, "Let's do that again, after my interview."

She excitedly nods, and Caesar regains control over the audience. He ends his introduction, and begins the interviews.

He calls up the girl from 1, Glimmer. I still think it's such a stupid name, and her outfit matches the stupidity. It's light pink in color, and see through, leaving little to imagination. I'm surprised to see anything but skin beneath the dress. Trying to get sponsors by posing as a sex object.

"Well hello Glimmer."

"Hi Caesar." Her voice is high pitched, almost like it's supposed to innocent sounding, contrasting the immodesty of her outfit.

"Let me ask you Glimmer, how ready are you for this?"

"I'm very ready, and I'm going in with confidence."

"I think you won't have a problem with sponsors, they probably all have their eyes on you right now." Yeah they all probably did, until we came on the scene, stealing them with our public display of affection.

Glimmer starts looking at all the tribute boys, saying "They definitely have their eyes on me." When she looks at me, she seductively says, " And maybe they want to give a little more," while licking her teeth.

The moment she looks at me is a perfect moment to undermine her. Effie even suggested it, but what can I say to do that. As it turns out, I don't need to. Katniss pulls off her shoes, and stands up, screaming, "Hey, what did I tell you about looking at my boyfriend?!"

Glimmer doesn't say anything, she simply stares at us, in anger. Caesar seems rather enamored with what he's seeing.

"Oh, so now you got nothing to say?! Where's all that confidence, or better yet where's your _competence_? Did your district not teach you those?"

The crowd loves her fiery temper, they give her a standing ovation for her outburst. I love what she said to get under Glimmer's skin, and it looks like it's working, cause Glimmer's face is simmering in anger.

Katniss yells, "You better hope that whatever sponsors still have their eyes on you have extra eyes to _give_ you once we get in that arena," before sitting herself back down and putting her shoes back on."

Caesar seemed slightly shocked at Katniss's words, and Glimmer is now fully enraged, but clearly trying to hide it. The crowd uproars in cheers and whistles for Katniss, especially when she leans into my shoulder.

The rest of Glimmer's interview is ruined, and since her interview had just begun, she literally has five minutes of shame. mostly by her own fault for not listening to Katniss. When Glimmer's interview ends, she walks back to her seat, scowling at us.

We don't pay any attention to Marvel, when he's called up. I just look at Katniss with a smile and an approving nod. We take a look at the main careers, and see that they're scowling at us just the same. I notice that when Clove looks at Glimmer, she looks quite condescending, I guess she knows how to follow someone's words. I pull Katniss in and whisper in her ear, "Hopefully Cato tries something as well."

We turn back to face Caesar for the interview which we still aren't paying attention to. In fact I kind of drift off, until I hear the crowd go into another uproar of whistles and cheers. I look to Marvel to see what he did, but he's looking towards us clearly pissed off, and not making any attempt to hide it. I wonder what happened, and then I turn and see Katniss swinging her now loose hair from side to side, and then starts waving to the crowd. I'm really surprised that she's able to do this, because knowing her, she's not good with making people like her.

When things quiet down, I quietly say, "I didn't know you were so good at making people like you."

"Gale. That was actually an accident, the bun was getting heavy and giving me a headache."

I look at her and just laugh, I couldn't believe it. When she tries to get people to like her she fails, when she doesn't she's a prodigy at it.

Caesar lets Marvel off in one last attempt to reinvigorate interest in him. He lets off a nice cry of enthusiasm, but his face as he walks back is furious.

Clove seems to have learned from Glimmer's error, and doesn't bother mentioning us demeaningly, or in an attempt to undermine us. She only says, "I have nothing very personal against them, that's their problem," gesturing to Glimmer and Marvel. I highly doubt that. She focuses primarily on herself. The crowd seems rather neutral at that, not cheering, but not booing or anything. I don't think it worked fully in her favor.

Cato's interview should be interesting. The first question Caesar asks him is about the clear feud between the career districts and ours.

"Caesar, I don't know what everyone's all over, seriously. Anyone, even the 12 year olds can take them on blind folded."

Caesar gives an ingenuine giggle, probably to make some noise since everything is silent, the crowd isn't impressed with his words.

"Cato, how will this interdistrict conflict play out in the arena?"

His admittedly menacing voice drops even lower, a point where it seems like he's a stealthy predator when he says, "A whole lotta blood will be spilled, and none of it is gonna be mine."

The crowd didn't like his earlier words, but they absolutely hate his most recent ones. The crowd is throwing screams of anger at him. Looks like us from 12 have seriously made a hell of an impact this year. They absolutely adore me and Katniss, I find it amazing.

Cato looks back at us, and I immediately say, "What? Not my fault you said the wrong thing."

He looks even more incensed, and he turns back and shakes his head. The rest of his interview is boring, completely ruined from his early words. I love how the careers are quite weak in appealing to sponsors and the citizens this year. It gives not just us, but everyone else a stronger chance.

With Cato's interview let off, the careers are behind us. Everyone else is incorporating their own tactics, most with much greater success than the careers. This is clearly not lost on them, evidenced by their obviously scornful reactions throughout the interviews. A few of them mention us, saying they were inspired by our flame. They imply that our flame inspired them to try, and not to give up. Things start to come to a head when he reaches Rue.

When he calls her up, she's wearing a green outfit with graceful gossamer wings, fitting for her since she can basically fly between the trees. The crowd seems as endeared to her as they are to us.

Caesar first asks her, "What do you love most being here?"

Rue quickly begins, "I would have said I loved the nice and filling food," she turns to look at us, "but there have been some things that really made my stay here good." The crowd is even more endeared to her now, and most of the crowd flashes her smiles.

"Now, you got a 7, not an easy feat for someone…" Caesar seems to be trying to find the right words, I can only guess why but I think it's because he doesn't want to offend her.

Rue finishes his sentence, "For someone from 11, or someone my age? Or both?"

Caesar's face collapses in apparently genuine guilt. Rue reaches to him, "It's ok, you could've said it, I know where I'm from and my age makes people think I'm weak. But that's a good thing. I may be weak, but I'm hard to catch, and if you can't catch me, you can't kill me. Don't count me out just yet."

Rue's small speech earns her a standing ovation, and when they quiet down, Caesar with sincerity tells her they wouldn't in a million years, ending her interview.

Now it's for Thresh. Whenever Caesar asks him a question, he answers simply, often yes or no, or short answers if it's not yes or no. Caesar seems to like it, as does the crowd, they probably like the strong and silent type of guy. Thresh doesn't even have to try and earn their adoration. Caesar seems to end the interview with the same overall tone, simply calling his name, and shaking his hand, rather than raising it in the air. It looked like Thresh appreciated that.

Caesar recollects his prior aura of flare, "And now for the girl you know as the girl on fire." The crowd immediately stands and applauds. "Well we know her as the lovely Katniss Everdeen."

Katniss stands up, clearly nervous, but she takes a breath, and moves forward in a unique gait. It accentuates the motion of her legs, making her lower half flare as noticeably as her top half. She also does a few twirls on the way, making her dress literally ignite in flames. This makes the crowd go crazy.

Caesar starts out, "Quite an energetic entrance now."

Katniss smiles, "Thank you, though truly, my stylist Cinna is the real deal here. He's been so great to me over the last few days."

"Of course. Please, Cinna, stand if you will." Cinna stands and gives a wave as the crowd applauds, though for me personally, Portia is the one, but I guess Cinna is kind of the leader of the two person team.

"Now, Katniss," he changes the subject, "I want to talk to you about the reaping, an event that moved everyone in here."

The crowd is appropriately silent, no one contests. You'll be okay Katniss, you can do it. Just let the emotion in and speak the truth.

"We were especially moved when you volunteered for your sister. Please, tell us about her."

"Her name's Prim, she's only 12. It was her first reaping and she only had 1 slip. She and Gale. They're the only ones that I can say I truly love."

"Did she come to see you after the reaping?"

"Yes. She did."

"And what did you feel, when Gale was called up?"

She hesitates before saying anything. It's a torment on her, and myself, and he knows why. "Nothing at first, and then I felt a rush of fear and horror. Because, I know that I'm gonna lose him." She's rapidly beginning to cry, as am I. "If it was just me, I would be in a sense alone, but I knew that I would have him to come home to, just as my sister and my mother."

Caesar takes her hand, appearing rather sympathetic to her. The crowd at this point joined us in our tears. I also begin to realize to the fullest extent Haymitch's advice, using our relationship to our advantage. There's nothing wrong with that, we're not faking anything, we're just showing everyone who we are. Me loving Katniss is more natural than breathing, and I know that it's the same for her.

She recovers from her sobbing, "The most painful part is, knowing that no matter what. Our future together is gone. All we can do...no. All we WILL do is fight for our lives. I hope that can at least make our families proud."

Caesar takes her by the hand, and when she looks at him, he gives her a sympathetic smile. "You are strong Katniss, and I know you will fight because that's the girl we've seen over these past few days." He stands up and announces her name once more, drawing a soft, but not weak applause from the crowd.

I'm already standing when she comes back to sit down. I take her by the hand, and give her a close mouthed kiss, drawing sympathetic cheers, rather than adoration cheers from the audience. I pull back from her, and whisper to her, "I love you Catnip." She smiles back at me, before I trek to Caesar.

Caesar decides to change the tone to something more cheerful. "You and Katniss know how to make entrances."

I simply accredit everything to Cinna and Portia, something that Caesar says he knew I would likely say.

"Now, tell us about the career feud here, we've heard their side, now let's hear the side of 12."

"Well, they offered me a place in their pack and I not so subtly turned them down." I look at him to see his face for what I'm about to say, "And I took the extra step of saying that we were safer and stronger without them.

"Gale. You and Katniss scores justify that perfectly. How do you like having the highest scores seen in a long time, not just in this year?"

"It feels nice, knowing that the rich kids are scared of the poor kids."

Apparently, the crowd and Caesar took a lot of humor in that. The laughing echoes loudly, and I simply look back at Katniss, who seems a lot more composed, and shrug. I glance at the careers who at this point are as livid as can be. I turn back and smile knowing that I'm doing my job well.

When he's done laughing, Caesar changes the subject back to me and Katniss, "How did you two meet?"

"We met officially right after the mining explosion that claimed our fathers four years ago." I can't tell him the full illegal truth here, "We became friends because we both had to be the breadwinners for our families."

Caesar gives a genuine smile. "You said you were friends, when did you become something more?"

"About a year ago, right after the last games. This 18-year-old girl invited me for some _fun_ times with her. Right in front of Katniss." The crowd seemed to be collectively holding laughter. "I said no, but nonetheless Katniss was evidently very jealous. I already knew what I felt for her after a few years, but I didn't know what she felt or even could feel for me. That incident left no doubt, our feelings were mutual."

Caesar seems enamored with the story, kind of hypnotized until I finish. "Now, Gale. Do you share Katniss's sentiments on the both of you being the tributes of 12?"

If he's asking me if I regret my love for her, definitely not. "I share her feelings, of knowing one of us will lose the other," the crowd begins murmuring amongst themselves, interviews don't usually involve such a somber topic, "but any regrets I have, none are because I love her."

The crowd loves what I said. They all stand up, whistling and cheering for me and Katniss. I feel a hand move across my shoulder, it's Katniss. I stand and pick her up, diving my lips onto hers in an open-mouthed kiss. We don't know if the sensors touch, that is until I feel a slight tingling sensation, and then hear nothing but silence. Almost as soon as the crowd goes silent, a huge uproar ensues. I pull back and open my eyes, and see that Katniss's dress is on fire, and so is my suit. Unlike the other flames from the parade, we feel the ones here, and it feels rather soothing. The tingling sensation doesn't feel like pins and needles, but I can't really place it. It's nothing I've ever felt before.

I look out to the crowd, and wave at them, drawing an even stronger applause from them. With that, Caesar ends my interview, and all of us file out back to where Effie and Haymitch were watching the interviews. Caesar's voice and face made it glaringly obvious how enamored he was with the sight before him.

Effie can't hide her pride and joy for us. "That was incredible!"

Haymitch is just as proud, but more reserved as per typical Haymitch. "You guys were amazing out there." They both pull us into a nice embrace, just as Cinna and Portia arrive and join in celebrating with us. Cinna and Portia express gratitude for us acknowledging them, but claim it was unnecessary. Haymitch expresses that he's genuinely hopeful for us when the games begin. So am I.

* * *

 _Song credit: Diamonds by Rihanna_


	14. We're Runnin' Out of Time

**A/N: Next chapter starts the games. I hope you liked last chapter.**

 **Disclaimer: I own nothing.**

* * *

 **We're Runnin Out of Time**

We're back on our floor for the last time. This is our last night. All I want is to make the most of it, but something is eating away at Katniss. She seems so much more distant than she did earlier, or maybe I'm just now noticing that there's something off with her. Right after we get out of the shower, and get dressed she asks me to come with her to the roof. She seems still so depressed, maybe from all the words exchanged in the interviews, but I'm not sure.

I get to her on the roof, where I find her in tears. "Catnip. What's wrong, was it something I said?"

She shakes her head, but doesn't turn to look at me. I move forward and I ask her again what's wrong.

"In less than 12 hours, they're gonna force us into an area where you're supposed to be my competitor, not my lover."

I see what she's getting at, "Well. The game makers are gonna have to deal with the fact that we'll never accept one another as competitors."

She turns around in my arms and rests into my chest. I pull her in tighter to me, and I refuse to let go of her. Because to me, the greatest fear is that I won't get to see her again once we're in the arena. We may get separated and never meet back up. I know I should be crying, but at this point, my emotions have already been drained from multiple consecutive emotional days. It's almost as if the emotion is becoming a part of us, it's becoming harder and harder to respond to the same emotional stimulus we've been feeling all this time.

Katniss tells me, "I wanted to come up here, because this is the only place I feel some kind of liberation. I wanted us to have it to ourselves one last time, before we're imprisoned in that arena."

"No explanation necessary Catnip. I get it." I understand far more than she thinks. We have so few moments left together, we better make the most of them. I move backwards and pull at her hands, I have a better place to spend some of our few remaining moments together.

I bring her downstairs, back down to her room. I close the door behind us, we're the last ones to call it a night, nothing will interrupt us.

I kiss her slowly, caressing her back slowly. Her arms return the favor, traveling under my thin shirt, first tracing the lines of my spine, before she reaches back down and grabs the bottom of my shirt and lifts it up. She pulls back from me and I lift my arms to allow her to remove my shirt.

I return my lips to hers, hungrily and calmly tasting her. She scratches down my back, slowly and gracefully. I left her up off the ground, and she wraps her legs around my waist.

I carry her to the bed, where I lay her down on her back, and I move my mouth to her neck, gently grazing her with my teeth. She presses against me, scratching my shoulders and arms.

Suddenly, I feel a sharp movement, and I find myself on my back, looking up at the lightly illuminated Katniss. She lowers her head to my chest, returning my earlier favor. She nips and sucks my nipples, all the while scratching down my body, making uncontrollable moans escape my mouth. She must be eager to mark me as hers.

She sits up, and removes her shirt, tossing it somewhere in the dark room. She gets off me, and takes my pants off. She doesn't take my boxers off, and she straddles me again, lowering her lips to mine once more.

I quickly take control back, flipping us over so that I'm on top again. As much control I may seem to have, Katniss ensures that I truly don't, reaching into my boxers to grip me. She slowly begins moving her hand, making me nearly scream in my moans. Before I completely lose control of my body, I take her bra off. I begin losing myself to Catnip's strokes. I take her hand and pull it away, pinning it to the bed. She's not taking any more control from me.

I give myself a minute to collect myself, before I turn the tables completely against her. I nearly rip off her pants, before reaching into her underwear, returning her favor to me. Unlike me, she doesn't try to stop me. I keep my fingers inside, moving them until I feel her lose herself completely.

Her labored breathing spurs me on, makes me want to pound her until we're both in a permanent oblivion. I don't hesitate for a moment, I crawl over her, right between her thighs, propping myself on my elbows. I position myself to her entrance before I push inside in full force, both of us gasping at the sensation.

I move slowly, but deeply. Her hands reach around me, returning to my back, once again scratching deep marks into it. Her lips go to my neck, sucking hard and deeply. This makes me move faster, especially when I feel her body cradle my cock tighter and tighter. My breathing becomes sporadic and uneven, and my muscles are rapidly tensing.

The electricity between us is far more powerful than it's ever been, no more awkwardness, no more hesitation, no more fear. I feel no apprehension as I did before, and Catnip doesn't seem to anymore.

My pace doesn't slow down, I keep accelerating, her body squeezing me more and more tightly.

I bury my face into her neck, just as she goes over the edge, screaming my name in ecstasy. She drags me with her into oblivion, forcing screams to escape me. I muffle them into her neck. I collapse on top of her, not caring if my weight is crushing her, refusing to pull out until I'm fully soft.

I roll onto my side, and Catnip moves until her back is flush against my front, pulling the quilts over us. A caution for the morning I suppose. I spoon her, hugging her tightly to me, not wanting to let her go. I gently stroke her arm and body until my eyes become to heavy to keep open.

* * *

I wake up to the feeling of someone shaking my head. I open my eyes, the image is blurry, but the wide yellow shape above me gives away who it is, Portia. Her wide gold hair is a giveaway. When I come to, I see her covering her eyes. Thanks for having some decency, Portia.

"Come on. Get up, you have three hours before the start."

I get Katniss awake and let her know. She seems as reluctant as I am to leave this bed, and face the reality of the next three hours, that it's so close, the possibility of a violent death.

In the shower, Katniss seems more down than I've ever seen her. I imagine the only other time she's ever been that down was after the mining explosion. I lift her face to look at me, and I dive my lips onto hers, trying to make us both feel better in that we still have one another. It sparks a small simmering ember between us, and we quickly increase that ember to a full flame.

The flame did little to stem what we were feeling. In fact, once were dressed, I see Katniss looking at herself in the mirror, tears emerging from her eyes. I do the only thing I know I can do, and let her lean against me, letting my body be a rock for her. I sit down her bed, leaning against the frame, and let her lie across my legs. We sit there for what feels like forever, repeatedly checking the clock as our time winds down, before Haymitch comes in, telling us that it's time for us to leave. He brings us to an elevator.

As we're riding, Haymitch explains to us, "The tributes are placed in randomly selected places for the start. You'll be on pedestals, don't step off before the gong rings, or you'll be blown sky high."

I remember a games where a girl dropped her token, I think it was a small wooden ball, and set some explosives off. They had to peel her bits of the ground.

Right as the doors open, he warns us as we walk to the hovercraft in front of us. "There are gonna be a lot of supplies right in the mouth of the structure in front of you, the Cornucopia, don't go for any of it. It's gonna be a bloodbath. Find something and get out of there, get to higher ground and find water, it'll be your new best friend."

With his speeches finished, he hands us off to the peacekeepers in the hovercraft. Not all the tributes are in here, maybe there are more hovercrafts. When we're seated, they take off, and this woman comes around with this huge needle gun, asking everyone for their arms, and injecting something glowing white into it. When she gets to Katniss, she asks her, "What's that?"

The woman takes her left arm and gives the injection, "Your tracker."

She comes to me, and the puts the needle in my right arm. It hurts, but not too much, the needle goes all the way in, but apparently only the skin. I feel the tracker as it stabilizes its position, but once it stops moving I don't feel it. We stay in the hovercraft flying for what feels like maybe 30 minutes. Maybe less. When we stop, the restraints on us lift, and we all leave. We enter the building in front of us, and I find that the doors all have images in them. I find mine on a door to the the far right, next to the wall. I don't bother trying to find Katniss's, I'm willing to bet that the door order doesn't correlate to where we'll be when we're in the arena. Before we split, Katniss pulls me to her, and pulls me for a brief close mouthed kiss.

Behind my door is a ladder, at the bottom I see a hall that turns left. As I keep going, I realize that this thing is a labyrinth of sorts, I was right. The hall is clean and pristine, and will only be used once, this one by me. This will end at the launching room, or the stockyard as we call it back home. Named for the place where animals go for the slaughter.

I find a door at the end, leading into a large room, with a small desk where Portia is sitting. She immediately stands up and gives me a hug. "How you holding up?"

"Not very good, Portia"

"Sorry. But I have something for you." She pulls out an outfit, "From the gamemakers, every tribute gets one. Use the shower, if you want some privacy."

A voice suddenly says "5 minutes to launch."

I quickly take the outfit, thank her for it, and change into it in the shower. I wonder why these things have those, do the stylists stay in here for the games? When I come out, she examines my outfit on me. "The suits heavy, the pants are pretty thick. They're full of thermal retainers. You're probably somewhere where it can get really cold. Maybe a tundra or a temperate forest."

"Good, me and Katniss are used to forests."

She simply smiles at me. "By the way Portia, I never thanked you for the ring you got me. Thank you."

"Sweetheart, no need to thank. That's what I'm here for." She places her hand on my shoulder, "I can't bet, but if I could, I would bet on you."

I'd hope so, but right now, people should be more focused on Katniss. I know that me and her are the only ones that know, but it still isn't easy going into this where one tribute represents two people.

"60 seconds to launch."

The announcement catches me out of my thoughts, and Portia immediately snaps my attention to her. "You go out there, and you show them what you're made of. You are from 12, show them what someone from 12 can do."

I nod to her, before I walk to the tube.

"30 seconds to launch."

Standing there in the tube, I'm so scared, for Katniss, for myself, for what we're going to see up there. The terror is so strong.

"10 seconds to launch."

Ten seconds feel like three hours. It feels like forever before the tube begins to spin shut. It immediately begins rising up, and Portia moves to see me as much as possible before the platform moves to high and she's obscured from view. It rises into a field, right in front of me is the Cornucopia, a black structure with a noticeable but vague horn shape to it, like it's mythical namesake, behind it is a lake. We're in a forest area. Excellent, this is where me and Katniss feel most at home. I look around and see the other tributes rising in their tubes. I look for Katniss, but I can't see her. I take advantage of the moment to examine everything around me. I see backpacks all over the field. The ones close to us are bright in color, and get harder to spot as they get closer to the Cornucopia. The structure itself is full of stuff, and in plain view, I see a bow and arrow. If Katniss can't get that, I'll get it for her. Or at least hold onto it for her. She's smart enough to make traps, she doesn't need it absolutely. Glimmers no good with it, it'll be fine even if she gets it. I remember Haymitch's advice, but I have to get something. I'm fast, much faster than most of these other people who live comparably sheltered, save for Rue and Thresh. I look around more, and I find Katniss, on the other side of the arc. She clearly knows what I want to do, and she shakes her head at me, but I've made up my mind.

"Let the 74th Hunger Games begin." Suddenly, a large cube-shaped hologram appears on the cornucopia, and starts counting down from 60. I immediately start positioning myself on the small pedestal, crouching down with my hands on the pedestal and my feet as far back as can safely go.

 _40_

I put my fingers over the edge of the pedestal, and reposition my feet slightly. I wanna get the biggest speed boost I can. I don't look around, I only focus on the Cornucopia, and the hologram.

 _20_

This is it. It comes down to this. The next several minutes determines the course of the games, and the fates of 23 people. I take a deep breath and prep myself for the gong.

 _5_

 _4_

 _3_

 _2_

 _1_

* * *

 _Song credit: No, no, no Part 2 by Destiny's Child ft. Wyclef Jean_


	15. Can Creep Up Inside

**A/N: Sorry about the song choice, the song was the only one that had a lyric like that. I needed it.**

 **Shoutout to** _ **tallbutnerdy**_ **for commenting the correct songs in the first two chapters. I hope you didn't just look at Chapter 3, and go back.**

 **Let the 74th Hunger Games BEGIN!**

 **Disclaimer: I own nothing.**

* * *

 **Can Creep Up Inside**

As soon as I hear the gong go off, I immediately rocket off my pedestal and sprint towards the Cornucopia. As I reach the Cornucopia someone tackles me. I look at the person, and I see it's Marvel, he tries to punch at me, but I catch his punch, and use my strength and his own weight against him, sending him rolling away from me. I stand back up and run back for the Cornucopia, but I give up on the idea of getting that bow for Katniss.

I reach the Cornucopia and grab the first bag that's at its mouth, a medium-sized khaki camouflage colored one. I run further inside to get something to fight with, and I find a rigid cloth belt full of knives. I immediately take it, and run out of the Cornucopia, barely avoiding a spear thrown by Marvel. The other careers are distracted killing the other tributes.

As I run off I try to find Katniss. I don't see her anywhere, nor do I see a corpse that looks like her. Her pedestal was to the right of the Cornucopia, she likely ran off into the other side of the forest in the clearing. It's too dangerous for me to try and get to that side, I've already tried my luck as it is. I run off to the forest, literally running into the girl from 5. We both get up, and she looks up at me, clearly terrified, especially because of the knives I have on me that are plainly visible. Neither of us do anything except stare at one another for a few moments, and then we run off in opposite directions.

As I keep running, I keep reiterating Haymitch's advice in my head, _water, it'll be your new best friend._

I eventually come to stop running near a small meadow. I look at it, feeling rather comfortable at the site of all the rue flowers growing in it. Come to think of it, I hope Rue herself is okay. She probably is, she'd be smart enough to run off from the bloodbath from the get go, unlike myself who was stupid enough to risk my life for supplies. But I guess it may have paid off a bit.

I start examining my supplies, starting with the knife belt. There's a whole assortment of knives; small, large, one is even curved slightly like a mini-sickle, and one has a ridged side like a saw.

I take a look in my bag, and I find a thick sleeping bag. There's a medium-sized water canteen, it's weight indicates it's full of water. I open it up, and I glance inside and I can visibly see a filter in the neck of the canteen. There's even a small medkit to treat small wounds, but nothing trauma-level obviously. To my elation, there's rope in here too, and a hell of a lot of it. This'll be good to set traps for the other tributes. I also find a pair of sunglasses inside, their black, except for a small raised dot on the left leg, and a sun-shaped symbol on the right. I put them on and I pressed the raised dot. I'm nearly blinded by what I see. I quickly take them off, and I look at them, they look like they brightened everything in their field of vision. I press the button again and they revert to normal. I put them back on, though I avoid pressing the button again. I don't what these things are for, but at least I can use them as sunglasses. The last thing I find in my bag is a small wooden box. Inside are what look like a lot of crackers. Last resort sustenance, but I can make do with the forest and trap animals.

I put everything back in my bag and I trek to look for a source of water, carefully drinking out of my canteen to save water.

I walk for what feels like forever, taking short resting breaks. I'm following Haymitch's implied advice, avoiding the other tributes. Katniss will do the same, and I bet Thresh will too. All three of us are capable of killing, but we have no wish to do so, so we stay away from everyone. The sun is high in the sky, it's still early afternoon when I hear a cannon. Those are what signals the death of a tribute. I stop to listen, and I count eight cannons. Eight people dead in the first 12 hours of the games. No more death occurs at once than in the earliest few minutes of the games.

I resume my search for water, and I come across a large river. This must be what feeds the lake. This is also probably where the other tributes will be if they're not at the dangerous lake, I better be careful. I gorge down the water left in my canteen, and keep on refilling and drinking until I feel nicely hydrated. I refill my canteen once more before I return to the dense forest, and start setting up traps, and small snares. I also make use of my small slender knives in place of a bow, with far less success than I typically have with a bow. I catch myself a couple of small squirrels, but that's it. No point in holding onto food out here, can't preserve it. I start a tiny fire to cook them and use a knife as a utensil. I stomp out the fire when I'm done.

It feels rather nice to be in the forest. It's so weird, I feel comfortable out here, even though I'm currently in a deathmatch with over ten other people now. Both me and Katniss are in the same emotional clash I bet. I hope she's okay, she and the little one. I want to try and find her, but I don't even know where to start. I could end up walking right into the careers, and unless I'm lucky, that'll be the end of me.

I find a tree where I can spend the rest of the daylight hours and sleep, a tall one with thick branches high up, strong enough to hold my heavier weight. Katniss has the advantage, here, she's much smaller than I am, and can climb more trees and higher up. I manage to find a nice large tree. I climb up to a nice thick branch that extends relatively flatly, and I tie myself to it before taking out my sleeping bag. It's only long enough to cover my legs anyway, but it does the job quite well in keeping me warm.

After the sun sets, I can see that the "sky" probably isn't a sky. Its got a star pattern, but there are also noticeable blue lines running through it. They extend as far as you can see along the horizon. A sudden cannon gets my attention, I wonder who just died. I look around and I don't find anyone nearby, dead or alive. I hope to God that wasn't Katniss. That's when the anthem of Panem begins, and a large figure appears in the sky. It starts with a label, _The Fallen_. It's everyone who was killed, the image of the person and their district. None of the 10 people dead today were from the career districts or double digit districts. Katniss and Rue are alive, and now both of them know that I am too. Whether or not they fit the definition of okay is entirely different. The fatigue of the events of today is finally getting to me, my eyes are heavy. I don't fight it, I simply let myself drift off to sleep.

* * *

It's been two days since the games began. Yesterday was uneventful, unlike the first day. In fact today has been just as uneventful, no cannons going off. Given the apparent size of the arena, judging from how far the false sky seems to stretch, I'm not surprised. If the tributes save for the careers spread out, we're probably spread out far. The days are so uneventful and monotonous, that I'm actually getting more nervous that something is gonna happen to simply spice things up. I know Katniss is probably very far from all of us by now. I chose to stay here, the food seems rather plenty, lots of animals to trap, and a good supply of water. I don't dare to pick anything, I can't recognize anything deadly. The meats I had are good sustenance, but not enough apparently. Today I feel weaker than normal, though that could be just because I'm used to the Capitol's food, since I've had it for a week.

I head over to the river to drink up, but also to think. Think about how my family and Katniss's are doing back home. I wonder if they can see me right now, watching me. This is a television show to the Capitol, that's how they'll display it. If there's a threat to me nearby, everyone will know about it. I can only hope that there isn't anything nearby that's harmful to me. I also wash my face a little, less to be clean and more to wake myself up.

Eventually, I let my hands sink into the river, the cold flow a comfort to my hands. I lift them out repeatedly, letting the water slip between my fingers, before I finally stand up to return to my area. I keep moving, wanting to simply wait out the days until the games end. Like that'll happen, the gamemakers would never let it. That only happened once, when the arena was a winter tundra where everyone pretty much stayed where they were and froze to death.

Out of nowhere, I hear a bizarre noise, a whooshing noise, like something big and heavy is moving through the air. It's rhythmic. I look around, trying to decipher where it's coming from. Not only that, but I'm also trying to determine what the hell I'm hearing. The whooshing is getting higher pitched and the rhythm is accelerating. I keep trying to figure out where it's coming from. The first thing that finally gets in my head is that something like that isn't natural.

The next thing I feel is something hard strike the side of the front of my head. I lunge to the side in response, and I start running, or at least trying to, while holding the spot where I was hit. I'm dazed from the impact, whatever it was struck me hard enough to make it hard to focus, I can hardly see. I have no sense of coordination right now. Before my senses return, something knocks me with great force to the ground. I regain enough of my vision to see some boy holding a large rock, clearly he wants to beat me to death with it. He throws the rock, but I manage to roll and avoid it, I regain enough of my strength and composure to stand up and pull out a knife from my belt, and I immediately charge forward.

I thrust the knife, but he manages to avoid it and pushes me away. My dizziness spell is quickly putting me at a disadvantage. He charges at me and tackles before I can react, knocking the knife I was holding out of my hand, and he takes another rock and tries to hit me with it.

I manage to knock the rock out of his hand, but my dazed mind prevents me from putting up an effective fight. He resorts to wrapping his palms around my throat. I stand no chance, my arms can't produce the force I normally can. I vainly attempt to do things to his face, but he simply brushes it off. Katniss, I hope you somehow know that my last thoughts are of you.

In a last ditch effort, I grab him by his hair and an ear and pull as hard as I can, causing him to loosen his grip on me. I don't hesitate for an instant, I hook him in the face, forcing him off of me. I can barely move now, I'm dizzy from the first strike to my head, and now I have to catch my breath. I manage to stand up, still trying to catch my breath.

I glance to my side, and through my blurry and darkened vision spot the boy reaching for the knife that was knocked out of my hand earlier. I try to flee, but I'm still catching my breath just from the strangulation, let alone how tired I am from defending myself. I hear footsteps behind me, and I turn and the boy punches, knocking and pinning me to the ground again. This time, he thrusts the knife down, but I move my head in time. He lifts it up and tries again, but I catch it with my right hand. I try to use my left to fight against him, trying to get him in the eye.

I grab his ear and roll us, trying to get him off me and get the knife away from him. I end up on my back again, below his knife. I try to reach for another knife in my desperation, but he seemed to have anticipated my move. He grabs my weaker left arm, and holds it away, before pinning it down with his foot.

I'm left with just my right hand pushing against his knife-wielding hand, and then against both his hands when he switches the task of his free hand to killing me too. I hold off for a time, but I'm even weaker from the punch combined with the prior headstrike. My arm rapidly weakens, and the knife begins lowering to my chest. It gets to the point where the knife's tip is very nearly touching my chest. I'm not going to survive past this moment.

The boy recoils, holding his eye, crying out in pain. I feel drastically less pressure on my left arm. I pull my left arm out and hook him across the face. I grab the knife from his hand, sinking the blade deep into his thigh with both my hands. He howls in agony a the stab. I rip the knife out, earning an even stronger scream, and blood rapidly fills his pants leg. He stands up and begins to frantically limp away.

My weakness surges through me again, far stronger than before, quickly putting a surge to fall asleep echo through my body. I let my head fall to the side, and the last thing I'm aware of when my vision goes black completely is someone running to me. I guess this is my last moment alive.

* * *

 _Song credit: Disturbia by Rihanna_


	16. Just What We Need

**A/N: I hope you guys liked that last chapter. If you guys made a correct guess as to who his savior is, good for you.**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own anything.**

* * *

 **Just What We Need**

I regain consciousness, my vision blurry from my dreamless sleep. I see that it's much darker than it was, and I realize that I have something obscuring my right eye. I feel it, and I recognize the texture, it feels like the gauze I had in my small medkit. I also realize that it is far too big to have come from my medkit. I slowly sit up, and I look around, and I find something silver nearby. It looks like a parachute, the ones that sponsors send. I wonder what was in it, or who it was for. As I look around, I notice someone behind a tree. The figure retreats quickly, but I know who it is, it has to be Rue. She's the only one who would hide and watch someone.

I stand up slowly, still slightly dazed, but now I have coordination, and walk over to the tree, and call to her quietly. She comes out from behind the tree when I reassure her I won't hurt her. She follows me back to where I was and sits with me.

I ask her, "What happened?"

"It was the boy from 7, he ambushed you with this." She pulls out a rock sling. It looks like it was carefully crafted, definitely a product of the Cornucopia.

"And then tried to finish me off." She nods. I put two and two together, "Were you the one that hit him, Rue?"

She confirms this, showing me her slingshot, and I reach over to her, and lightly hold her hand, "Rue. I don't know how to thank you for that." She saved my life.

"No need." She simply leans into me, like my brothers and Posy would. "7 didn't get far, before his cannon went off."

Suddenly, the realization sinks in, I just killed someone. So what if I was defending myself, I still killed someone. Someone died directly by my hands. Strangely, I don't feel an emotion, no sorrow, horror, or even self-loathing for what I did. I simply feel a vacuum of human emotion when I call the thought. Am I ruthless, just like the careers? Am I really as bad as they are?

Before I lose myself further, I speak to keep my sanity, changing the subject entirely. "You know, we should go check my snare traps."

She gives me a little mischievous smile, just like the one she had when she stole Cato's knife. She turns and pulls out two squirrels impaled on sticks. They're already cooked. "When did you go get these?"

"After that parachute came in." She hands me the larger squirrel. "It had a large bandage and some kind of cream. There was also a small bottle with a syringe." A gift from the sponsors to help me heal up, thanks Haymitch. "There was a note in it. It said, _Cream first, injection second. H._ "

I start wondering, "Have you gotten any parachutes?"

She shakes her head. Part of me is saddened, but then again, she doesn't look like she actually needs any.

She asks me, "How are you feeling? That fight did a real number on you."

"My head still hurts, but at least now I can see and walk."

She looks me in the eye, "Katniss is far off now. I was following her, but then I saw you. Something told me it'd be worth it to stay by you, and it was right."

This little girl is absolutely amazing.

"They, Cato and the others, are further down the river, they haven't been there long."

"All of them?"

Rue nods. "They were talking about you guys. Again. They're trying to hunt you both down. Clove especially seemed angry."

"Those crazies have a whole lot of reason to envy me and Katniss." Mostly because of our training score. The people with the highest scores are the most prime of targets.

I decide it's time for us to call it for a night. We find the tree I've been using, and climb up to a branch, and I tie the both us to it, with Rue sitting in front of me, lying against my chest. The sleeping bag is big enough for us to fit both our legs in. With that, she drifts off to sleep. But me, with my earlier brush with death, find it hard to sleep for a while. That, and I can't shake the feeling that I'll hear a cannon go off and see Katniss's image in the sky.

* * *

I wake up late into the morning, my head feels so much better now. I realize that I'm alone, Rue is gone. The rope around me is tied in a different knot than that which I tie. She must've untied herself and left, but I don't know why. I take the bandage on my head off, and look at my reflection on my water canteen, I don't see anything that looks like bruise. That cream Rue was talking about seems to have done its job to the extreme.

The emotion of remorse and regret finally sink in when I start thinking about the boy from 7, the boy I killed. Whatever defense my mind was using to keep me safe from myself has now failed. I begin to tear up, this is something I can never take back. This was someone's son, someone's brother, someone's nephew, maybe someone's boyfriend. One of the 23 lives destined to be snuffed in this arena, was now by own hand. I just brought a family's greatest dreadful fear to life. Even if I was defending myself from him, it doesn't change that I still killed someone.

My mind quickly regains its defense mechanism, and forces me to be alert of my own surroundings. I quickly notice a large smoke column nearby. It's on the other side of the river, and its thick and black, it's a fresh fire. I wonder who started the fire that got out of control. Rue told me Katniss went that way, but I don't hear a cannon, and one didn't wake me up in the night. I get out of the tree and make my way to the river for a drink. Maybe she made it past the area where the is started.

As I start drinking and refilling my canteen, I notice that the smoke column suddenly and dramatically thins before vanishing completely. No forest fire that produces a smoke column of that magnitude goes out that quickly. I can easily guess that the fire was a product of the game makers. Guess the fight I had yesterday wasn't action enough for them.

I go and I start setting my snares back up for the day, as well as checking the ones from the night. They didn't catch much, just one rabbit.

Before I can start to do anything with it, I hear Rue's voice call for me. She's climbing down a nearby tree.

"Rue? What's up?"

"I found Katniss."

Great, now I can find her, and I'm not gonna leave her at all. "Where?"

Her face and voice aren't excited, more worried. "The other side of the river. That fire pushed her back to us. The careers found her and they chased her."

Oh my God. "Is she okay? I didn't hear a cannon." Oh my God, are they doing something to her for fun? If they are, those sick fucks will pay with blood and pain.

"They have her trapped in a tree. They couldn't climb after her, or shoot her with the bow, they're gonna and try and starve her out. I saw her doing something to her leg, and whatever it was, it clearly hurt her a lot."

I simply collapse back to the ground, covering my face with my hands. I feel just as helpless as I did during my nightmare. There's no pain or death right now, but it's just as bad. We can't do anything against 6 people, even if 2 of them are incompetent.

"Gale," Rue easily tells how I currently feel, "She'll be okay, we're gonna figure something out."

I know Katniss can last for a bit without food, but she'll be marooned there for days. Food is one thing, but water is another situation.

"I'll go back, and scout things. We'll find a way to help her." She comes over and sits in front of me, and I look at her.

"Rue. I don't know if there's anything that can be done. She can't move like you can between trees. And we'd be two against six. Plus, knowing her, she probably doesn't have any weapons, she probably took the first thing she could and then left."

Rue doesn't contest that tidbit. She'd been watching her before, she would've seen if she had a weapon on her. That and judging from the color of the pack she had earlier, she got it from the edge of the field too. But she does try to reassure me, "We don't know that. Maybe we can somehow lure them away from her."

I concede to her, I guess it's better to try to find a way out than to simply surrender. With my formality of permission, she goes off to the river, where I see her vanish into the leaves of the trees. I don't want to just simply give up on Katniss, but I have to be realistic. But she's right, if we can't attack them, we could very well distract them. If we set up decoy fires, maybe that'll do the trick.

* * *

It's well into the afternoon when she comes back. This time, she seems more optimistic, compared to earlier today when she seemed disappointed.

"I think I know a way to get the careers away from Katniss."

I stand up and walk towards her. "Whatcha got?"

"I found a nest in her tree, a hive of some kind. I think they might be tracker jackers."

Those are some of the most lethal things in existence. They're mutts that look like wasps, products of the Capitol produced in the first rebellion. Their venom attacks your mind, inducing powerful hallucinations. I remember being told stories about them when I was young. The venom is also deadly, one sting alone is enough to send someone into a delirious state. In this arena, delirium is deadly to the victim, preventing them from being able to defend themselves. True to their name, they're said to chase down anyone who disturbs their nest trying to kill them.

"The branch the nest is on is thin enough to cut down."

"Rue, you are brilliant."

"I signaled to Katniss to try and drop it on them, but she made it clear she didn't have anything to cut it down with."

I remember something. "Wait I think I may have something." I reach to the knives on my belt, and I found the knife. It was the one with a ridged side, like a saw. It can probably cut through the branch in short order.

"How are we gonna get this to her?"

Rue seems more than ecstatic, "I can."

"Okay, I have an idea." I scoot in closer to her. "Let's get this to her early in the morning. Odds are she'll be awake before the careers. She can drop it on them then, catch em off guard."

Rue responds, "Good."

For some reason, Rue suddenly changes the topic. "How's your head?"

"Much better. Been better however."

She stands up and looks at the spot where I was hit. "There's hardly anything here. Barely even a trace of a bruise. You're lucky, you know that right?"

She has no clue. "Oh I know I'm lucky. Lucky that you were around when that happened."

"Not what I meant. You're lucky that the injury wasn't worse. Had that sling been stronger, your image would've been the one in the sky."

"Guess I won the lottery twice in that case." She's been so concerned about me, I haven't shown anything about her. "But what about you? Where's Thresh?"

She sits next to me after checking the spot on my head. "He knew I didn't really need protection in the truest sense. He left to the wheat field not far from the lake. He's been hiding in there like a land shark. It's working, the careers left him be."

Smart guy. "I guess what works, works."

She leans into me. It brings back a familiar feeling, one I get from Rory and Prim. It's so bad when I think about it. Just the sheer possibility that people so young can be put into this death trap is awful enough on its own. Then for the two of us, we live in some of the worst conditions anyone can imagine.

"You know Rue? Back home I got three younger siblings. Two brothers, and a sister. The oldest brother is your age. We spend a lot of time simply sitting around like this."

She sits up straight and looks at me. "What are they like? Your family?"

I tell her all about my family. Particularly my dad, though that's more for me. More so that I can keep his memory alive in my head. Posy, how she's still so young and has yet to learn the true cruelty of the world. Vick, not old enough to be reaped, still has a lot to learn. Rory, spunky as ever, rebellious, and loves to make fun of me and Katniss. It's not often that kids can be kids in this world.

Rue tells me about her family as well. About her parents back home and her five younger siblings. She told me about the sheer heartbreak and the heart-wrenching scream her mother let out, especially when the escort asked for a volunteer, the former of which they didn't air. She also told me how she helps her family in a very risky way. She forages for food in their fields for more food, an action for which there is severe punishment. Kind of mirrors Katniss, in that she and I illegally hunt out in the woods outside of our district.

* * *

After the sun sets, I suddenly have an idea. "Rue, I need you to take me to the careers's camp."

"Why?"

Then I remember, the sun already set. It's too late, too dark. "Never mind. It's too late."

She pulls my face to look at her, "Don't leave me hanging, I wanna hear what your idea was."

"It doesn't matter, it's too late, too dark."

She retreats back, and pulls something from my bag. The full moon lights things up just enough for me to see it's my sunglasses. "Rue, what are you doing?"

"Just put these on." I don't see any point in protesting, so I put them on. She reaches to the left leg, where I remember the button is. Suddenly, the whole area's lit up. It's in a green like texture, but very clear. Rue's eyes are glowing with this, and then I realize, they're night vision. How could I have been such an idiot? "Wow, how did I not know these were night vision?"

Rue simply shrugs. "Will you tell me your idea now?"

I explain to her my idea, for us to scout the area around the careers's camp, and determine where they would run first. I want to do this so I can set a trap for one of them. Make sure that one of them doesn't escape from the tracker jackers.

She makes it clear that she doesn't like the idea. But I can take a guess that we both know that our lives are at stake here. We stop when we can clearly see the fire the careers started in the distance.

"Rue, you can get a better view of the area." I hand her my night vision glasses. She seems to understand what I mean, since she can climb trees and move through them swiftly.

She nods to me. "You stay here. I'll be back as soon as I can."

I watch her dark silhouette vanish into the leaves above me. "Good luck." I look over in the direction of the flames, and I think about what Katniss is feeling right now. I hope she's hanging in there.

She reminds me so much of Prim from back home. Home. Before the reaping. When me and Katniss were worried about entering the same mines where our fathers died. I wonder how things would've turned out had the reaping not turned out how it did. I start wondering if this is really any worse than the mines. I start thinking about all the what ifs. This was my last reaping, after this, I would've been condemned to a lifetime of working in the mines, 12 hours a day only to come home to a run down shell of a home, and quickly darkening my complexion to a coal dust color. It's a life that truly doesn't seem like it would be worth living. Then again, at least there's a chance at living a full life in the mines, in here, odds are I'll be dead in the next few days. I have been and will be lucky to keep seeing the light of the next day. A whole bunch have already fallen victim to these odds, and anybody could be next.

I'm startled out of my thought-filled by something hitting me. I impulsively react and pull out a knife looking for whoever threw it.

"Gale, it's just me." It was Rue.

"I've been trying to get your attention, but you were really lost. Thought that touching you would be too risky." Wow, she must have come back while I was staring off towards the light of the flame, and I didn't even notice her approach. I'm lucky that it was only her, and that nobody else came by and tried to sneak up on me again. I gotta make sure I don't do that again. I need to keep my concentration throughout this god-forsaken event.

"I'm sorry Rue. I was...thinking."

"Yeah well, think about this. I found something that might be of interest. Follow me."

She brings me to what looks like a tiny clearing. It's frighteningly close to the careers's camp, in fact, you can actually see them from here. Not just figures in the distance, but you can actually tell who's who from here.

Rue's voice drops to a low whisper, "I think. They'll run this way. The nest is directly on the other side of the tree."

Rue is really smart for her age. But I guess growing up moving through trees like she lives in them, you learn how to perceive things differently.

I can set a good trap here, a snare designed to trap someone by their foot. I need a counterweight of some sort, maybe Rue's backpack.

I ask her what she has in there, and she tells me it's not much. I tell her my idea to use it for a counterweight, and she likes it. She puts the rest of her stuff in my own bag, and we quietly start gathering rocks to use for a counterweight. We fill the bag until it's definitely heavy enough that depending on how we set it up, could actually hang someone by their foot if they're light enough.

I have her go up a nearby tree, with the rope I had, measuring it out so that it's the proper length when I cut it, not giving the victim a chance to step away once they step on the trap. She had a small amount of wire, a thin but strong one. Good thing she kept it, cause I use it as the trip wire for the bag. After working for a couple hours, we finally have the trap done. I just hope that the trap works, and we didn't just waste our time.

We go to a tree a little bit further away to call it a night.

* * *

 _Song credit: Hide and Seek by Imogen Heap_


	17. The Darkness is the Light

**Disclaimer: I don't own this.**

* * *

 **The Darkness Is the Light**

Rue hastily wakes me up. She shakes me awake, trying to get me up so that we can start the plan before it's too late.

"Okay, Rue." I'm still a bit groggy. She reaches into our shared bag and pulls out my water canteen, giving me a small splash to wake me up. If it weren't for the nearby river, I would be upset at the waste. Though I still say, "Hey, don't be wasteful."

She reminds me, "Gale, I don't think the careers are awake. This is our chance."

By that point I'm awake enough to pull out the ridged knife we've been holding on to. "You can get this to her right?"

"Yes."

"Good luck." I untie the both of us, and I let her off to move between the trees. I climb down the tree, and move myself to where I can get a closer look at the careers, near to where my trap is. I find the small clearing where Rue brought me last night, where my trap is. I move to a tree near to my booby trapped tree. I climb up and I get a good vantage point of the camp, and Katniss's tree.

When I look around the tree, I spot the hive that Rue was talking about. The branch is in fact really narrow, but right next to the main branch that connects to the tree. It's gonna be difficult to cut it down without getting the attention of the tracker jackers. However, sawing a branch off is more inconspicuous than simply trying to rip the branch off. Nearby, I spot a parachute in the tree. I wonder what was in it. Maybe food since she was trapped up there.

I notice that Katniss is reacting to something in the tree above me, must be Rue. The next thing I see, Katniss unties herself from the tree, and starts climbing around the tree, until I can't see her. There aren't any bushes on the other side I can hide behind, too risky to try and move over there. I look around the trees to see if I can find Rue. I can't spot her anywhere, and that's good, if I can't see her, neither can anyone else. That's what makes this girl an adversary to the careers. No catch no kill.

The next thing I see is Katniss reappearing, she's climbing toward the nest. I'm scared for her right now, because one slip up, and the careers will wake up. Either that or the trackers will realize what she's doing and attack and kill her.

She reaches the branch with the nest, and begins to saw the branch. She keeps checking below on the careers, smart girl. I notice that she starts flinching, the jackers outside the nest must have noticed her. Luckily, they don't seem to be swarming her, they don't realize what she's doing.

The next thing I see, the branch is wobbles, and falls. It falls down, right on top of one of the girls, the one from 4. The other careers jolt up and start screaming as the wasps start flying around swarming them. The first one up is Glimmer. She runs right in the direction of my trap, carrying the bow and the quiver. One moment she's running, the next she's on the ground, her leg pulled into the air. She starts thrashing around, screaming trying to swat away the wasps. The other careers run past her without giving any hint they wanted to help her. I look back and I spot the girl from 4 tripping over the roots of Katniss's tree with the wasps swarming her, she's not gonna make it either.

She hopelessly stands back up and attempts to run, but collapses before she can get anywhere. Her face is beginning to swell up horribly as her screaming stops.

Glimmer, still screaming for help, is reaching for her leg, trying to free herself from my trap. It's all for nought as her face begins to bloat just like that of the girl from 4, before she stops screaming and collapses back. She vainly struggles before she stops moving completely.

Suddenly I hear a thud, I look back to the camp, and find that Katniss is on her back trying to stand. She probably fell out of her tree. The wasps have left by now, chasing the other careers, it's safe to trek the ground. I jump out of mine and immediately run to Katniss. She has three large lumps on her body, one on her hand and two at the nape of her neck, around her collarbones. I immediately go to her and I try to pick her up, she resists me, probably because the venom from the stings is clouding her ability to comprehend reality. I yell to her who I am, and she seems to calm down. She still has enough of herself to recognize it's me. I pick her up and carry her to a downed log some distance from the now-abandoned camp, laying her down on her back, reassuring her I'd be right back.

I go back to find Glimmer and claim her weapon, but she doesn't have it when I get to her. I have no time to search for it, I have to go back to Katniss. I quickly turn to run back to Katniss, but before I can, someone tackles me. As I roll and recover, I get a look at him, it's Cato. Guess he didn't leave all the way to the lake as I thought he would. We both quickly get up and stand, facing one another as if we were feral apex predators. He doesn't have any visible lumps on him, must have gotten away fast enough to avoid getting swarmed by the jackers.

I remind him of what happened in training. "You already know how this is gonna end."

"Yeah. I do." He pulls out a baton from us jacket, "With your death."

"Good luck with that, you weren't even smart enough to use it when you got to me."

He glares at me with a bloodthirsty gaze before charging at me. I pull out two knives and use them to deflect his first swing, losing both of them. I reach for the hand holding the baton, trying to get him to lose the sword. I push him against the tree, and he drops the sword. But he manages to wrestle his other hand free and punches me in the face before kicking me away. He runs right into me and knocks me to the ground again. This time, he doesn't let me get up, he moves to get on top of me, trying to thrust a knife into me.

I catch the hand holding the knife, pushing with all I have against him before I reach for his face, forcing him to recoil enough for me to roll myself on top of him, and turning the knife against him, aiming for his neck. He's as strong as I am, and he keeps the knife from moving. I give up on the nice and simply punch him in the face, and he responds with one of his own.

He pulls on my hair and rolls us again, ending up with him on top again. He tries to thrust the knife again. This time he keeps my stronger right hand from reaching the blade. My weaker left one is unable to keep up on its own, and I feel the knife sink deep into my left shoulder. I take advantage of the moment, and manage to punch him off of me. I quickly take the moment to rip out the knife, but I don't feel anything at it. I quickly make a break, stumbling on the direction of the baton, though I try to make it seem like I'm trying to escape.

Cato yells, "Where do you think you're going?" My plan works, he comes right at me, and I swing the baton at him. Hitting him in the gut. He immediately keels over and vomits. He recovers enough to start going off, apparently not wanting to fight any further. I'm too tired from this to go after him. I just hope that my baton strike was enough that it would kill him, no matter how slowly. Part of me believes that we won't be so lucky.

* * *

Carrying the baton, and holding my injured shoulder, I trek back to where I left Katniss. It takes all the willpower I have to avoid falling down and closing my eyes. Katniss isn't alone when I find her, Rue's with her, as well as the bow and the arrows. Figures. Of course she went to go get them herself, I should've thought of that. Looking at Katniss, she has what look like leaves over her sting areas. I wonder why she used leaves instead of the medical stuff in my backpack I left with her.

Rue looks at me and her face melts into horror at what she sees. "What happened?!"

Through my breaths, I tell her that it was Cato.

She immediately takes the baton, and takes me by my hand, pulling me to the downed tree, and has me sit down next to Katniss. She helps me remove my jacket, and then my shirt, so that she can get a look at the wound. The look on her face tells me it's serious.

"Bad, isn't it?"

She hesitatingly nods. "I don't know what to do."

"I guess we can start with just cleaning it out."

She goes to the backpack and pulls out the medkit. It has nothing that could really treat this wound of mine, but it's the best we got. I know enough medical stuff to know that if this hit anything major, I would already be dead. So now we just gotta keep it clean.

The medkit has a small bottle of water, which she pours onto my wound, making me cry out in pain from it. She uses the last of it to clean her own hands before doing something with leaves. She chews on it before applying it to the bandage, which she applies to my shoulder. The pasty-feeling stuff makes my wound sting, I know that's a good thing. The thing didn't have anything for stitches, maybe those only come from sponsors. The bandage is hardly big enough to cover my entire wound, and it was the only one. I guess a really good medkit only comes from a sponsor, maybe not even then. With her treatment of me done, I ask her how Katniss is doing.

"She'll make it. The leaves on her are good medicine."

"How'd you learn that?"

"Back home, we basically live and work in the trees. Tracker jacker incidents and other injuries are common, and we all quickly learned how to treat them without a doctor nearby."

"You never cease to amaze me."

She simply smiles, before she brings me my canteen from the backpack. I hastily drink the water until it's empty. Now that my adrenaline surge is wearing off, I feel the pain of my wound, as well as how hungry and parched I am.

Rue takes my canteen and tells me, "I'm gonna get some more for you." She takes two, one must be Katniss's.

Suddenly I hear two cannons go off. They must be for the girls killed by the tracker jackers. All the stings they got, and they took that long to die? I guess the stings didn't kill them right away, must've been alive for the whole time. They may have been sadistic and enjoying the kill, but no one deserves to suffer that way. We just wiped out two careers simultaneously, we from 11 and 12 sent 1 and 2 running. District 4 doesn't count this year, they have no deadly abilities. In fact, the spear I avoided that I thought was from the boy from 4, I wonder if it was actually from him.

Now that I'm sitting, the urge to close my eyes and relax is suddenly returning, and it's overwhelming. Carrying Katniss this distance running, running back to Glimmer, the fight with Cato, and the blood loss from my wound have taken a toll on me. I have no reason by which to stay awake now, and I simply collapse to the side and let myself drift off to sleep. I just hope that when Rue comes back, she's alone because I'm in no condition for another fight of any kind.

* * *

When I wake up, I find Rue sitting nearby. She's started a tiny fire, using it to cook a small game animal. I'm too groggy to tell what right now. Judging by the light, it's definitely well into the evening. I sit up, the pain from my shoulder still fresh, but at least now not as intense.

I ask, "How long was I out?"

Rue says, "You didn't sleep for more than a day if that's what you're asking."

"Cute. Anything special that I should know about?"

"No more cannons went off."

"Whatcha got there?"

"I went back to some of your snares, found a few things."

She pulls out two squirrels and a rabbit. Much better than we've been in a bit since we got here. "I'll take a squirrel please."

She teasingly smiles and keeps pulling away from me. I simply play along with it and pretend to beg her for the squirrel. When she hands it to me, I cook and devour it as fast as I can. Famished can't even begin to describe how I feel right now.

"Where are Cato and the other careers?"

"Down by the lake, sleeping off the venom. Cato's awake though."

Son of a bitch is a tough nut to crack. I give him points for it, but still. I glance over to a still-unconscious Katniss. "How long will she be out for?"

"Don't know. Could be for a while."

I believe it, that venom is a hell of a concoction. In fact, it's rather lucky if you get this much poison and ever wake up. I also notice something on her leg. It looks like a healed burn wound. For myself, I know that at some point, we're gonna need stitches to fix this wound of mine. It's too much to try and move my left arm right now, I gotta wait a little before then. Suddenly I hear some kind of chime. I look around, but I can't find it. "What is that?"

Rue answers that it's a parachute. "Should land somewhere right around here."

Then I see it, floating right above us, landing right next to Rue. I move closer as she opens it. It has a small container of what looks like liquid, alongside a needle . She also pulls out a small note.

 _Full dose in each sting. Stay alive. H._

Must be to treat Katniss's stings. A little late for that, but I guess he has his reasons. Better late than never. I move to Katniss and remove the leaves on her stings. Rue takes out the needle and the container, and extracts liquid until the needle is full, and then injects it into the sting on her hand. She cleans the needle and repeats until all three have been treated. By then, the liquid is gone, completely empty.

I look up and say, "Thank you Haymitch." Now all we gotta do is wait.

* * *

 _Song credit: Disturbia by Rihanna_


	18. A Strength I've Never Known

**A/N: Sorry I've taken so long with this chapter. The holidays have left me without a laptop which is more reliable than my iPad. The good news is I have several more chapters ready to publish. Hope you guys had happy holidays and an even better new year. I've published a second fanfic which is a kind of sequel/companion story to Twilight. Thank you guys for all the support.**

* * *

 **A Strength I've Never Known**

For the first time since this whole thing began, I sleep on the ground, kind of risky. I refuse to let Rue do the same, I had her take what was left of the rope, and go up one of the trees, so she could sleep safely. If somebody comes around and tries to do something, nothing will protect us and she needs to be safe. The dead tributes were Glimmer and the girl from 4. No one else was killed today, by us anyway. However, during the night, a cannon fires and the image shows the District 10 boy. I wonder how he died. Maybe he was already dying for a while, or maybe Cato got to him. I don't know how many people that leaves us with. The only ones I can think of are Foxface, Thresh, Cato, Clove, and Marvel. The latter three are the primary physical threat to us, Foxface and Thresh are more of our survivalist adversaries. Regardless, this isn't ending anytime soon.

I can move my left arm, but not very much. And the area around the wound is still killing me, we seriously need more medical supplies, or else this thing is gonna get infected. I'm lucky enough as is that the knife wasn't bigger, or that it didn't hit something important. In fact, I'm seriously surprised that it _didn't_ hit anything important. Katniss looks far better, the stings under her leaves are practically gone. In fact, she wakes up not long after I do, those injections did their job and then some. She's facing away from me when she gets up.

"Hey Catnip."

Her eyes light up when she turns and sees me. "Gale?" She immediately perks up, looks at me in shock, before smiling and diving to hug and kiss me. She dives right on my stabbed shoulder, earning her a cry of pain from me. "Ow! Careful."

"Sorry. Sorry." She recoils and looks at my injured shoulder. "What happened?"

"Got into it with Cato. Again. This time, he had a knife. We used what we could to treat it, which wasn't much."

She drops her head. "Fuck."

I look up to find Rue hiding behind a large tree, similar to how she would do in training. I gesture for her to come to us, something Katniss doesn't fail to notice. She looks in the direction gesture, and spots Rue. She comes running towards us, holding Cato's large baton.

"Where did you guys get that?"

"Cato tried to beat me with it." I slightly smile, "The only one that got a beating was him."

Katniss retorts, "And you got the stabbing."

Rue brings back Katniss's bow and arrow. "Managed to get this for you."

Katniss seems happy to have her preferred weapon back. She finally asks the logical question. "How long was I out?"

Rue answers, "About 24 hours. They gave us a parachute specifically for the stings."

"What happened while I was out?"

I answer, "The girls from 1 and 4, and the boy from 10."

Rue tells us both, "Cato and the others are down by the lake. They're still sleeping off the venom. They got all their stuff piled up in this great big pyramid."

Katniss smiles, "That sounds tempting."

Rue mischievously nods, and I giggle.

Rue asks, "How's your shoulder, Gale?"

"It's fine for now. I don't know how long that'll last if we don't get more medical supplies."

Katniss rightfully appears to be dumbfounded, "You got your bag right from the Cornucopia, how did it not contain something for that kind of a wound?"

Rue interjects, "Maybe those only come from sponsors."

I second her. "She's right. Remember, Haymitch said something about how certain things can only come from sponsors. Maybe a trauma kit is among those."

She tilts her head in concession.

Rue tells us that she's going to check some of my snares back at me and her previous campground. Apparently she learned how to reset them just from watching me. She's an old soul in a 12 year old body. I wasn't even that intuitive and smart at that age. Katniss quickly insists she's not going alone. No reason for any of us to stay here. This isn't a permanent settlement for us, just an immediate retreat. I go along with them, still weak from yesterday.

* * *

Back in the area me and Rue originally claimed, we found only a single small creature that resembled, but obviously wasn't a rat. Katniss and Rue left to hunt and forage for more food. They didn't want me coming along, straining myself any further than I already have. They gave me the whole animal before they left.

They return with two rabbits, 1 squirrel, one owl, and a whole lot of berries. Now this is a real meal, like the ones we would have back home in the meadow outside the district. Rue also has some more leaves, the ones that she used on my wound. She removes my old bandage, and uses more leaf-chewed paste on a larger leaf as a makeshift replacement. I hope they're enough to stem an infection off, but a part of me thinks that it won't.

"Nice job Catnip. Just like old times."

She smiles a bit, "You know Gale, that wasn't that long ago."

I play smart with her, "Four years ago is kind of a long time."

She sarcastically laughs. Rue's just looking at us with an adorable smile. We continue to crack jokes into the day, talking about how things were before, when we were younger. All about one another's old times.

Rue told us the story behind her token, something she made herself as a good luck charm. Her token is gorgeous, a flower-shaped wooden charm on a length of woven grass loosely around her neck. She apparently forgot to wear it on the day of the reaping, her mother brought it in with her when she visited. It originally didn't have the wooden flower, it was just a grass woven necklace. Her mother got her the wooden flower when an elderly woman at their market gave it to her, for a reason still lost on her to this day. She says that her stylists replaced the original flower with a larger, newer one made of the same wood, but treated with stuff to prevent it from fading as the original did, since it's a couple years old. That reminds me heavily of how I got Katniss her mockingjay pin, how I got it and not having to pay for it.

Rue seems just as surprised at how similar the ways Katniss and herself received their tribute tokens. She thought that it was so romantic me getting Katniss the pin as her token, something that made Katniss and myself blush a little. Yet again, another similarity to my brother Rory, both of them are still to justly make fun of couples (or at least us).

My story is comparably boring. Simply asking my own stylist to get me something that would likely remind me of my home. Portia was clever in making my ring look like coal, though the physical texture betrays the real material. At a glance it's quite convincing. Rue flashes me a _seriously?_ face when I told the short story, Katniss is just as amused.

Suddenly, I remember a question that had popped into my head yesterday. "Katniss, what was in that parachute? The one I saw in the tree."

"Burn medicine." She looks at her healed burn wound. "My guess is the gamemakers didn't like me avoiding the other tributes. Thought it'd be funny to use fire to lure the girl on fire to the careers."

Dark sense of humor. "After the bloodbath, I just kept moving. I found an area next to the river that I felt was safe enough. Two days later I learned it wasn't."

She looks at me in curiosity. "What do you mean?"

Right. I hadn't told her. "Two days after the bloodbath, I was coming back from the river when I was attacked."

Rue comes in too. "The boy from 7. He used a rock sling and hit him in the head."

Katniss recoils in sorrow at hearing this.

I continue, "We fought for a while, me being weaker because of the headstrike. He got the upper hand and was about to stab me."

Katniss is shaking her head, whispering to herself as she typically does when she's under duress.

Rue chimes in again, "That's when I saved him." She scoots next to me. "Hit 7 in the head with a rock from my slingshot." Katniss smiles genuinely and brightly upon hearing this.

I finish what I remember. "I got my knife back when he recoiled, and then I stabbed him in the leg. Later I learned it was fatal."

Rue fills in the gap between me falling unconscious and waking up hours later. "He may have survived, but he wasn't looking so good. I managed to pull him somewhere distant from the scene of the fight." I'm still marveling that she could do that, given our size difference. "He was really bad, especially his head where the rock hit. I did what I could, but I was sure he wasn't gonna make it. Until a parachute came in, with bandages, a needle, and a cream. He recovered within a day because of that stuff."

Katniss simply sits there, unable to form words. After a few minutes, she finally says, "So she saved both of us."

Rue and I look at each other and just nod. She did after all.

I stand up to get some water, and I suddenly get a huge rushing feeling in my head. It for an instant renders my senses of sight and hearing completely useless, and destroys my sense of balance. I grab a tree to keep myself upright, something that Katniss notices. "Gale, are you okay?"

The moment she asks, my senses return, and I no longer feel so light-headed. "Yeah. I'm fine."

The river water is soothing and feels far cooler than normal. I still feel kind of dizzy and I feel a little disoriented. I've been like this ever since I got stabbed by Cato, is this the effect of losing a lot of blood? I don't know what's happening to me. I can soldier my way through this though, I have to. I have to be strong to be able to protect Rue and Katniss.

I recover from my disorientation spell by the time I get back to Rue and Katniss. Apparently, they came up with something while I was away, something they're more than willing to share.

Katniss starts it off, "We have a plan, to even the odds against the careers."

That piques my attention, "Well don't leave me hanging."

Katniss explains, "Rue and you will light three decoy fires, while I find a way to destroy the supply pyramid they have. I don't exactly know, maybe I could just set them on fire."

I have a thought, "Maybe I could set a trap for the first flame."

Rue interjects, "Do you have enough rope left for that?"

When I check the rope left in the backpack, it's nowhere near enough. Not even for an effective snare. Killing one career took up too much rope. The girls seem a little disappointed, but are nonetheless willing to go through with the plan. Katniss tells me, "We'll do it tomorrow morning."

I'm looking forward to this, if we can destroy all the careers's goodies, the odds will drastically tip away from them. We have known for a long time that the careers have very poor survival skills, so forcing them to survive rather than have everything handed to them as always will even the playing field. Atala herself said this, exposure can kill as easily as a knife, so let's fully expose them.

As the afternoon begins fading into twilight, a parachute chime rings through the area. The parachute lands right behind me, and the girls move closer to see what's in it. This one seems bigger than the one with the medicine for Katniss's stings. Inside is a thick rolled up length of very light and very strong rope. The note inside reads: _Glad you found her. Don't let her go. H._

Thank you Haymitch. I will say, I wouldn't have expected the note to be so sentimental. The enigmatic man has his reasons, but I don't care at the moment. He just gave us what we needed to show the careers what we're made of. And this length of rope is enough to set several more snare traps around our area.

"Katniss, Rue. Remember the trap I said I couldn't set? Well, it looks like I can set it after all."

Katniss looks a bit apprehensive. I don't think she's had to do anything like this yet, unlike myself who has already directly killed someone. "Katniss. You ok?"

She humors me, "Yes."

I inherently can tell she's not, but we leave it at that. I guess it's better to, for lack of better words, agree to disagree. We don't have much of a choice, if we want to live through this.

* * *

 _Song credit: Praying by Kesha_


	19. Tears from the Eye

**Please read**

 **A/N: I want to announce that I am officially writing for the remaining two books/three films. I will make the "Mockingjay" fanfic two individual works similar to the films. I have an offer to make for any readers who are also good with digital art. I would like for you guys to make a cover image for this story, and the remaining three. In exchange, you can give me a character that I will involve in the rest of the stories I make for this series. This character is yours to make, but only the winner of this little competition I have will be able to make it. Have fun if you choose to participate. My google email that I want you to use is at the bottom of the chapter under the song credit. I will accept submissions until January 29. Send me one file that includes all four images. Can't wait to see them!**

 **If you have any questions at all, do not hesitate to send me a PM.**

* * *

 **Tears from the Eye**

Yesterday, the plan seemed so simple. Distract the careers, and destroy their supplies. But how the fuck do we do that? Set it on fire, throw poison all over it? I don't know how Katniss plans to do it, but I'm not gonna let her do it by herself.

"Katniss, you're not doing this alone."

She insists to me, "And Rue isn't doing her half alone either. She gestures to my shoulder, "And you're no good to me crippled."

Part of me always hated her stubbornness. But if I think like that, I'll be a hypocrite, since I'm just the same. Also, I don't appreciate her bluntly calling me useless to her right there. "Stop trying, cause I'm not letting you go at the careers's stuff alone."

"Gale, look at yourself, you may be trying to fool yourself, but you're not fooling me. Anyone can see how weakened you are. You don't have the strength for any fights right now." It's completely useless for me to try and fool her, she'll see through any lie or deception I try to fool her with. "I can handle myself. You don't have to worry about me."

Her telling me not to worry is telling water not to be wet. But I ultimately give up to her. She's right, if I get into another fight right now, I'll never make it. I grab her and tell her, "You better come back to me."

She leans in and kisses me, and then reassures me she will. Rue comes in from nowhere, saying, "We need some kind of signal, in case we get held up."

Katniss asks, "Okay, like what?"

I see Rue glance at something for a bit, before signing four notes. Suddenly, the birds around us begin singing the same four notes. I find it amazing, who would think of that. I say, "Mockingjays, that's brilliant."

"We use them to signal back home all the time. You try."

Katniss whistles four notes, which the mockingjays mimic.

"Okay so. If we hear that, it means we're fine."

I interject, "I guess my and Rue's signal will be the same, since I'll be with her."

Katniss and Rue nod, before Katniss walks off for the lake. I really don't like this. I know she can hold herself, especially because she has a bow now. I don't want to be separated from her, I can't be. But we have no choice.

"Gale." Rue brings me from my thoughts, "We have to go."

We make it to the first pile of foliage, where I set a lethal trap in the direction the careers will come from. It's my most dangerous trap, a trap where the victim is fatally hanged. We wait for a little bit before we light the fire, to ensure Katniss is at the lake, and give her time to scout how she could destroy the supplies. I hope this works, because then we will truly stand a chance at surviving.

Rue ignites the pile, and we wait just enough to make sure the flames begin billowing and smoking. We run off once they do.

At the second flame, we don't hesitate to ignite it. The second flame was designed to simply extend the time necessary for Katniss to destroy the supplies.

Suddenly, a cannon goes off. Immediately, I think the worst. I immediately want to run towards the lake, I'm so scared that that cannon was for her. Rue apparently sees what I want to do, and grabs my arms. "She's okay Gale. Remember the trap?" She's right. That cannon was probably for the career who fell into my trap. We quickly climb up a thick leaved tree with strong branches as the second flame begins to billow.

Not even ten minutes later, the careers arrive at our second flame. They run right below the tree we're in. Only three original careers are here, Cato, Clove, Marvel. They have another boy with them, I'm pretty sure the boy from 3. The boy from 4 isn't here, maybe the cannon was for him.

Cato is evidently pissed off. "We were fucking set up." He angrily swings his sword at the nearest tree. "Meant to catch us in a trap." I was right, the boy from 4 was killed in my trap. I hoped it would be Cato, but go figure that I wouldn't have that much luck.

Clove seems smarter than the others, "Must have been the bitch and loverboy."

The boy with them says, "Good thing that they're not the only ones who can set traps."

Immediately after, a huge boom rings through the area. An explosion. The careers and 3 immediately look off in the direction of the explosion, the direction of the lake, and gleefully smile and start running for it. What the hell did they do at the lake? I hope that Katniss wasn't killed in the explosion. I haven't heard any other cannons, they would've gone off if she did. But then again, she may be just injured, and be dying, or be unable to move, rendering her vulnerable to the careers. Or maybe her cannon was obscured in the explosion itself.

Once the careers leave, I quickly climb down the tree, and my impulses tell me to run towards the lake too. The moment another cannon goes off, I start running, until I feel someone trip me up from behind. "Gale. Stop!" It's Rue. "You don't know if that was for her."

"I need to be sure."

"If she's okay, we'll hear the mockingjays. Let's just get back to the camp."

I still want to run to the explosion. But she's right. God almighty, I need to be smarter. I have to keep my emotions under control. I have to just believe that she's okay. Unless something turns up indicating otherwise, she's alive.

* * *

We've been waiting nearly all day for Katniss to arrive back at our camp. We haven't heard any mockingjay melodies or cannons in the past several hours. With each passing hour, my agony grows and grows. Rue is there to comfort me each moment. It's the worst kind of torture possible, not knowing what happened. At least with my father, I knew what had happened. I knew for a fact I couldn't see him again, I knew he wasn't in this world. But when you know nothing, you can never have any kind of closure.

"She's okay Gale."

"Rue." I'm starting to tear up at this point. "How can you be so sure?"

"I just believe."

That's better than nothing. I guess.

She turns my head to look at her, "We'll find her. I know we will."

I start having thoughts. "Maybe it's better if she doesn't."

Her face changes to one of confusion. "What do you mean?"

"Rue. Look at all this. How many of us are left? You, me, Thresh, Katniss, the girl from 5, Cato and Clove." My tears begin rapidly falling from my eyes. "Maybe it's better that we're not together. Better if we stay separate, and not be forced to kill one another."

Rue sinks into me. I guess she understands what I mean. The worst part of this competition is that part, when tributes from alliances or even the same districts are the last remaining, forcing them to betray one another. Cato mentioned it when he offered me a place with the careers, once everyone else is gone, all bets are off. I can't bring myself to hurt Katniss, and she couldn't do it to me either. The full teams are Cato and Clove, Rue and Thresh, and myself and Katniss. It fully dawns on me what Seneca Crane meant when he said these would be the most interesting games ever, especially if it's me and Katniss remaining in the arena. But at least now, I can avoid Katniss entirely, and prevent that scenario from occurring. Hopefully, only one of us will make it to the end.

Rue stands up. "We should get some more food. We don't have much left."

"We can check my snares. But those aren't a guarantee."

"You go check the snares. I can find some food to pick around here."

I don't like having to split up. "Are you sure?"

She nods. "I'll be fine."

My snares have been better than they normally have been in recent days. I guess the gamemakers decided to let loose more animals into the arena. Almost all of my snares have caught squirrels, a rather good day by typical standards. My body feels like it's getting weaker and weaker as the hours pass. I don't know why, I'm not starving or dehydrated. Even so, I feel a constant drain of energy.

Back at camp, Rue's back with a bunch of dark berries. She looks elated at the bounty I got from my snares. We don't really talk much while we eat. We just kind of keep to ourselves for the time. Until another cannon goes off. This time, I have enough control of myself to avoid running off, trying to find Katniss. I know she's alive. I believe she's alive. The night will show everyone who's died, and I believe that Katniss's image will not be among them.

Rue. She still can tell that I'm in a dreadful state. She stands and moves behind me, and wraps her arms around me, resting her head on my own. It works, helping me to relax a bit. "She's okay. I just know it."

Her words of assurance work to an extent. I want believe that she's okay. But a part of me still will fear the worst until I find her again.

We climb up a tree, where we rest until the anthem comes on. It shows, the boy from 4, the boy from 5, and the girl from 5. I wonder how Foxface got it. I feel somewhat bad about it. It stopped with her, Katniss is still alive. I relax somewhat, knowing that she's okay and knowing that she knows that me and Rue are okay. That leaves, me, Rue, Katniss, Clove, Cato, Marvel, and Thresh.

Oh my god, it's so cold. Why is this morning so cold, it feels like the season suddenly changed to winter when the sun rose. I feel myself shiver incredibly fiercely, desperate to make the cold feeling go away.

I feel movement in front of me, but my eyes are closed. It must be Rue. I feel something go across my forehead, it's her small hand. "Oh. My. You're burning up Gale."

I try to be humorous, and say, "Ironic, since me and my girlfriend are the couple on fire."

Rue sarcastically laughs. I open my eyes, and watch as she reaches for the area where my shoulder is. My injured one. The look on her face when she looks at it makes it obvious to me that it's bad. I ask her if it is.

She says, "You're gonna be fine." It is bad. She's not denying it. It must have gotten infected. I'm no doctor, but I'm guessing I have blood poisoning from the stab.

"Rue," I say, "that's not a denial."

She looks at me, and she looks like she wants to cry. "Gale. Whatever you do. Stay here." She loosens herself, and then ties me to the tree again. "I'm gonna try and find something around here for the fever." I want to contest it, but I don't try to keep her from leaving, because I can't. She jumps down from the branch, and scampers off. I want to go with her, but I know I'll only be an impediment to her right now. I can only hope she finds something, or the sponsors send something to help me. I drift off to a semi conscious state, unable to sleep, but too weak to stay awake.

"HEEEEELP!" I'm jerked awake by a loud cry for help. I hear another, and I quickly recognize that it's Rue. "Katniss! Gale! Help!" Something must have happened, the careers maybe. Maybe, no, it has to be them, they're our only enemies left in the arena.

I know I don't stand a chance in a fight right now, but I don't care. I couldn't live with myself if I just ignored her cries. I untie myself from the tree as fast as I can, and let myself fall on my right side. The impact wasn't on my wounded side, but the rebound through my body was enough to intensely hurt that part of me. I manage to fight through it and start moving as fast as I can in the direction I hear Rue's calls.

The sounds keep getting louder, but I hope that I'm not imagining it. I hope that she's really in danger and this isn't my head messing with me. I feel like half of me isn't in my body, like I'm distant from my own limbs. I feel myself weaken as I move more. Katniss, I pray you hear her too.

I almost collapse against a tree, barely able to make out my surroundings anymore. I need a moment to catch my breath. But, Rue's voice is very loud, like she's right here. I look around, but I don't see her. I move against the tree until I'm on the other side, and I can see her, she's struggling against a net, but I don't see anyone else.

Before I can move, a figure comes from nowhere, right to Rue. She pulls out a knife, and I pull out one of my own, ready to kill whoever just came here. Luckily, I'm slow moving right now, because the person I'm about ready to kill is cutting Rue out of the net. I stop in my tracks, and the person pulls Rue out of the net. The two immediately embrace, and then Rue sees me.

Rue yells, "Gale!" The figure turns to look at me, it's Katniss. I would've just nearly killed Katniss.

She screams, "GALE!" She springs to her feet, throwing herself on me, knocking my weakened body to the ground. The impact is much more direct, shooting a lot of pain through me.

I manage to say, in a very low whisper, through my pain, "Hey...Hey Catnip." I don't think she realizes how weak I am right now.

Rue as it seemed, didn't forget. She quickly runs over, trying to get Katniss's attention. When she does, she says, "Gale's wound. It's bad."

Katniss instantly switches from elated to worried, "What?" Rue moves and starts examining my injury, the look on Katniss's face filled with dread. "Oh God."

And then, through the trees, on the other side of the clearing, a figure pops out. A figure in a green jacket, with a spear. I focus my vision and see it's Marvel. He must've come running when Rue was screaming.

I quickly warn the girls to him, but I'm so weak and slow of mind I do it an instant too late. He throws a spear at us, but I can't tell where it's going, it's too fast. It goes right to Katniss, but she moves out of its way just in time.

Katniss quickly draws an arrow and fires it, right into Marvel's chest. He grabs the arrow, and I pity him a bit. It's cruel, to suffer a fate such as that. Especially one like this, because he knows for an instant that he is dying, and that he will not survive such an injury. Before he even hits the ground, I hear his cannon fire.

I turn to Katniss and say, "Nice shot."

My heart wrenches and skips a beat when I turn to Rue. She's standing right where she was before. Except, she now has a spear stuck into her abdomen.

* * *

 _Song credit: Make it Rain by Ed Sheeran_

 _valentinlaboy1234 at gmail_


	20. Find Your Peace

**A/N: Here it is you guys. The tragic end to the life of young Rue.**

 **Reminder of the small contest for cover art for this story and the next three. Details are in the previous chapter. I hope that you guys will take me up on my offer to you guys.**

* * *

 **Find Your Peace**

Rue. She pulls the spear from her body, blood spilling rapidly from her wound. The look on her face torments me. One of horror and resignation. She knows, Katniss knows, I know, we all know, that her time has run out. Katniss quickly runs to her as she begins collapsing. Her petite frame fits into Catnip's arms as well as Prim's would.

I quickly pull myself to my feet, forgetting about my prior pain, fighting through it to get to Rue. I manage to get next to Katniss and we jointly cradle little Rue, tears rapidly filling our eyes and her.

Katniss vainly says, "You're gonna be okay." Her voice makes it obvious she doesn't feel what she says.

Rue doesn't visually or verbally respond. Her only words are, "Did you blow up the food?"

"Yes," she says, "every bit of it." That explosion was her destroying the careers's supplies. It worked after all.

"Good."

I croak through my tears, "I'm sorry Rue."

She quickly wipes away the tears from my eyes. She grabs her token, her little flower-shaped wooden charm. She removes it, and gives it to me. "You have nothing to be sorry for. Thank you."

I place a shaky and unstable hand under her head and wipe the tear from her cheek. This is all my fault. "You have to win.", she says to Catnip. I agree with you Rue. I will make sure of it. "Can you sing?"

Katniss nods. And she tearfully sings. A song that she's always sang to Prim whenever she had a nightmare or was sick.

 _Deep in the meadow, under the willow_

 _A bed of grass, a soft green pillow_

Rue's eyes stare blankly off into space.

 _Lay down your head, and close your eyes_

 _And when you awake, the sun will rise_

And then her eyes stop moving. Her chest stops rising and falling. And then a cannon fires. She's gone. I feel beyond horrible, I feel like a failure. I let this little innocent girl go, I shouldn't have let her leave for my sake. Katniss doesn't fail to notice the lifelessness of Rue. She closes the little girl's eyes, so she may sleep peacefully.

We both rapidly descend into an ennui born of our shared guilt for not being able to save this little girl. I simply cradle her lifeless body, but Katniss suffers a far more explosive onset of emotion. She grabs Marvel's spear and throws it away in anger, wailing loudly. Neither of us care about how sounds attract things, this is all wrong. This little girl deserved better than this, she never should've been here. She was so young, so innocent, she had a life ahead of herself.

I finally let go of the hand she used to give me her charm. But I can't bear to just leave Rue here. I place my arms under her knees and shoulder blades. I use every ounce of my being to pick her up, because I wish to bring her to the place where she truly belongs. My wounded shoulder isn't impeding this luckily.

Katniss quickly asks, "What are you doing?" I don't answer. I just start walking in a familiar direction. I hear Katniss slowly follow me, still wailing, but now a little more quietly.

Finally, I reach it. The first clearing in the forest I came across. Katniss finally understands what I was doing. I brought Rue to the field full of the beautiful purple flowers for which she was named. She deserves this at least. I know that a hovercraft will take her away, but at least I can do this to ease my mind. Katniss seems more at ease, too.

I move to a spot where a ray of sunshine beams down. I place Rue gently on the ground, and I give her one last gift. I kiss my three middle fingers, and raise them to honor her. Katniss follows suit. My eyes are churning out tears. This girl, is now gone. I can only hope that her family may be at peace, having seen our relationship with her. I cradle her, and tearfully say, "I'm so sorry. Please find it in yourself to forgive me. Forgive me for failing you. Rest in peace, little Rue." I finally retreat from her, and I reposition her to how I had her before. I move back and I finally notice that Katniss is carrying several of the rue flowers in a bouquet-like fashion. Once I move back from Rue, Katniss goes down to her and places the flowers in her hands, before mumbling something tearfully to the lifeless little girl. I'm too caught up in my own emotions to hear her words.

The next thing I realize, I'm falling down on the ground, my body unable to stand or do anything else. The last thing I remember, I hear Katniss screaming my name in desperation before everything goes dark.

* * *

I wake up, barely able to make out where I am. I can't see anything. I look around, until I see a beam of light coming from somewhere above me. I'm not blind, I'm not dead, I'm in a cave. I think. The orange color of the light outside makes it clear that it's around the afternoon. I hear my name being called, before I see Katniss throw herself on top of me. She looks and sounds relieved that I'm awake.

I simply say, "Hey, Catnip."

She says with several breaths of relief, "Gale, you scared me to death."

"What happened? Where are we?"

She says, "You just passed out." She feels my head. "You're worse now."

Rue would've noticed. That must have been why she left. She left for me. To help me. Katniss cradles my head in her lap. I ask her where we are.

Catnip says, "In a cave, by the river."

I start thinking about why I passed out. "My wound, it's bad isn't it?"

She doesn't say anything. She normally does that when she means yes, but doesn't want to say it. She only tries to reassure me that I'll be okay, in a tone that makes it obvious she feels this as much as she felt it when she said the same to Rue.

"You never were good at lying to me."

At that, Katniss gives a slight smile. She stretches out, and uses her backpack as a pillow for me. She rests her head on my chest, rubbing soothing patterns through the fabric.

I have to say this now, "Catnip. Go."

She looks up at me incredulously, "What?"

It's better if she leaves me. She has to live, for Prim. "Go. We both know what's gonna happen pretty soon if we stay together."

She lays her head back down on me. "No, it's not gonna happen."

 _Attention, tributes, attention._ The announcer's voice echoes loudly through the cave. _The regulations requiring a single victor have been, suspended. From now on, two victors may be crowned if they_ both _originate from the same district. This will be the only announcement._

Oh my God, can this be? Katniss looks at me with absolute shock and elation in her eyes. Maybe we can go home together after all. She dives her lips onto mine, an explosion of passion born not of need to unite because of dread, but because of renewed hope.

Katniss pulls away with a smile on her face.

"Gale, we can go home."

I return her smile, but I don't speak my thoughts. How am I gonna be able to go home, unless Haymitch gets us something that can help me through my infection. I won't last much longer with how I am.

Katniss places her hand over my head again, whispering something I can't understand. I'm about to ask her what she said when we hear the trademark chime of the sponsor parachutes. Katniss quickly goes to find it.

I want to follow her, but I can barely stand, let alone move. I see Catnip ominously disappear into the orange light shining through the cave entrance, like her soul just moved on. She comes back in with the parachute's container. Inside it, as another large grey container, that had soup in it. The small note inside read, _Don't give up Gale. E._

I'm surprised, I thought that only Haymitch could send us sponsor gifts. Maybe he did, but gave us, or at least me, Effie's message.

Katniss begins feeding me the soup. The warmth of the soup feels soothing to my stomach. The flavor is better than anything I've eaten in the past week.

"You need some of this too, Catnip."

She quickly brushes me off, telling me that she can hunt for her own food. I know she can, but I don't feel good knowing that she's not feeding herself. However, knowing that she'll shove the soup down my throat if she needed, I don't protest further.

I say, "I feel like you're mothering me Catnip," in an attempt to make humor of the situation. She simply scoffs lightly, but does smile. It's not long before the soup is gone.

Katniss rests her hand on my head, and asks, "How are you feeling?"

"A little better." I say. It's the truth. "My head isn't throbbing as much anymore."

"Good." She takes a sleeping bag and wraps the both of us in it, and rests her head on my chest. I wrap my arms around her, and hold her to me, never wanting to let go of what I can't live without, the woman I love. She's meant everything to me for what feels like forever, a forever I don't ever want to end. My memories of Katniss, our firsts and our precious moments reverberate in my head as sleep takes me away.

* * *

I'm stirred awake by the sudden bright light in front of my eyes. God almighty, my body. I feel like something is ravaging my body, liquefying me. I keep trying to move, but I can only move my arms. My vision slowly returns to me. I feel Katniss stir next to me. If I know her well enough, she'll have already been awake for a while now. She quickly looks at me, her face melting into sheer horror. She quickly rests her hand on my head, before saying, "Jesus Christ. You're fucking on fire." Ironic she says that, since I feel like I'm gonna freeze. Also because of our collective nickname. It feels so cold, at least to me. I say, "Katniss, please just-"

Katniss anticipates my words, "No." I'm no good to her, nor will I live through this. Effie and Haymitch may not want me to give up, but...I have to be real. I can't survive this infection. I'd have a hard time surviving it even with available treatments.

Katniss continues, "We've come this far, we're not giving up now."

"Catnip, we both know I won't make it." I can barely speak. It feels like I'm losing myself to this infection. Not just my life, but everything that I am. I feel like my entire person is fading from me.

Katniss, she's desperate. She quietly cries out, "You don't know that." I understand her, she lost a girl she cared for so much, and now she's losing me.

I say, "Yes. We both do Katniss."

Her face melts into absolute fury, and she practically screams in tears, "Don't you do that to me! Don't you fucking dare give up on me! You can't!" She recoils away from me in a barrage of sobs.

I whimper, "I'm sorry Catnip." As bad as this is for me, she has to sit and watch as I wither away.

She comes back and lifts my upper half and rests it on her legs. She tearfully says, "You can't give up. I won't let you give up." She pulls my head up to look at her directly, a tear falling from her eye onto my face. She closes her eyes in pure despair. "Cause you're gonna be a daddy."

* * *

 _Song credit: Praying by Kesha_


	21. Hide the Truth

**A/N: I hope you guys liked what I did with the last chapter. A huge thanks to brand new beta Emily Ellis for helping me with these chapters onwards.**

 **And even better news, after the other fics are published, I will make one final fic. I will write this fic again, but this time, from Katniss's perspective.**

 **With the competition I started in Chapter 19, you still have until the 29th to send me an email with the four images. I hoped you guys would be more willing to take me up on it. Look at Chapter 19 for more details.**

* * *

 **Hide the Truth**

What did she just say? Did she just say that she's... Katniss reads my face well. She says, "Yes. I am."

I say the first thing that pops into my head. "How long...have you known?"

She wipes tears from her eyes. "Remember the night you woke up from a nightmare? And you started yelling for me?"

I think back to that night. I remember the violent nightmare I had one night. I woke up and she came running from the bathroom. "Yes."

She says, "I confirmed it that night. Not with a test, but just thinking back several weeks. I realized that my last period was in May."

So that was why she was in the bathroom so late into the night. Through my labored breathing, I ask, "Why didn't you tell me?"

"I...because...because I couldn't put you through that pain. Of losing more than just me. Back when only one of us could make it out, I thought it'd be better if you didn't know to begin with. I'm sorry. I know I should've told you."

I don't feel angry, not at all. She's right to have had that fear. "When do you think it happened?"

She smiles tearfully, and lifts her shirt and places my hand against her belly. "I'm pretty sure it's from my birthday."

It makes sense, she said something to the effect of two months. The only time we had sex at that time was that picnic on her birthday. I can't believe it. That night, her birthday. It meant so much to both of us, finally losing our virginity. And now, to know that night gave us a kid... It means so much more.

If anybody says that her pregnancy doesn't change anything, than they are true monsters. I used to think the deaths of children as young as Rue and Prim was the worst that the Capitol could do, but now I've just found something far worse. Katniss will make it. Even if I don't make it, she has to make it out of here. For her family, for our kid.

Before I can say anything, Katniss seems to read my mind. She says, "I'm not gonna leave you. You're gonna make it. You and I. We're gonna get out of here, and you're gonna get to hold your baby." She lowers her face and gives me a passionate kiss, a passion I've been yearning for for several days now. She rests my head down on a soft bag and rests herself on my much larger frame, her legs intertwined with mine and her head right over my heart. A familiar position, just like her birthday, a happier day. I remember what she said that day so clearly, how she was afraid of what could happen. She was right, too right. As always, if something could get worse, it will.

We just lay here together, seemingly alone. Katniss seems to be sleeping. I think about our baby, and what this world will do to it. Katniss and I both know that I'm not gonna make it. It's up to her to protect it just the same way she did Prim. Katniss's mother will as well. I look around the cave, and find an odd spot close to the floor, it seems to be moving. I think it's a camera. I look at the ceiling again. Thank you mom. Thank you for telling me to at least try to have a relationship with Katniss. I was too much of a chicken to actually try my luck with her, but it was because of you that I wasn't apprehensive at having a relationship with her. Thank you mom.

As it turns out, Katniss isn't sleeping. She rouses and looks at me. She says, "I should also tell you, that nobody knew. Not Prim, not my mom, not Haymitch or Effie, not even Cinna. No one knew. It was something I kept from everyone...except for Rue."

"When did you tell her?"

She looks down sheepishly, "During the last day of training. You chose to stay on your own at the survival skills one last time, and I went with her to the crafting area. I confided it in her. I needed to get it off my chest."

I don't feel anger at her keeping this from me. "Why did you feel like you had to hide it from me? From everyone else, even Prim?"

Catnip answers, "I don't even fully know. I guess, I was just afraid. I've never been pregnant before, and I didn't know how you'd react. I didn't know if it would be good for you to know, it'd just cause more pain...if you lost me. But after losing Rue, I realized...I couldn't keep it from you anymore. With everyone else, I don't really know why. I honestly can't answer that."

I try to make light of our situation, "Well. In that case. I think you stopped the heart of Panem when you said that I'm gonna be a daddy."

She gives a slight chuckle. "I guess Seneca Crane was right when he said that this...us...would make these games really interesting."

"He even went as far as giving us both a chance to walk out of this arena alive." Though not really, since I may as well be dead already. I think Catnip feels the same way. I slap myself mentally, berating myself for even letting my hopes start to rise.

"I love you, Gale."

"I love you too, Catnip."

I have to tell her. "Katniss. No matter what happens to me, you have to make it out of here. You have to live. For our kid. Just like Rue said. Promise me that you'll make it out of here."

She sits up. "I'm not gonna promise you that. Because you're gonna make it too. We both are."

Okay. It's not worth it to try and convince her otherwise. I'll leave her to her beliefs and wishes. She goes back to cuddling me. I change the subject. "That explosion, yesterday, what was that?"

"That was me. At the careers' camp. They had all their stuff in a pile. First thing I saw was the new guy they had with them, the boy from 3. I saw him running off with the others to the first fire. I noticed all these piles of dirt around the pedestals we came off of when we got here. At first I wasn't certain about what that meant. Until I saw Foxface. She came in and started jumping around the area. I realized that they must have used the guy from 3 to reactivate the mines that Haymitch mentioned. I shot at a bag of apples, and they all went off at once, destroying the pile, and my hearing in my left ear."

Her ear concerns me, but I'm more worried about something else. "Katniss. Are you sure the baby's alright?"

She confidently responds, "Yes. I'm pretty sure that I would know if the explosion did anything to hurt it."

"I hope so."

She massages my abs a little and reassures me the baby's fine. I know she'd tell me otherwise, but I still am just worried. Something comes into my mind. "Katniss, so when you were reluctant to go through with this plan, it wasn't because you were reluctant to hurt others was it?"

She says, "That was a small part of it. But yeah, it was mostly because I had known by then that I was pregnant."

We spend what feels like forever with Catnip laying against my weakening and sickly body. Out of the blue, I ask her, "What do you think would've happened? If our fathers were still alive?"

She sits up a bit and faces me, instantly understanding what I mean. "I honestly…I don't know. I would love to think that we would've found each other."

I'm surprised she didn't ask me why I was asking. But I guess she knew we would have this talk at some point. I ask, "If you had the choice, to choose a life with your father, what would you choose?"

Catnip sighs, and opens her mouth to say something, but doesn't. It's too deep of a question to really ask, but I'm certain we both know the answer to it. We both know ourselves well enough to know that we would likely choose our fathers. Neither of us admit it to one another. I'm willing to bet we don't even admit it to ourselves. I know I'm not admitting it to myself.

Katniss finally says, "It doesn't really matter what we _would_ choose now. Fate already chose it for us. But to answer your question. I wouldn't change a thing if I knew I would have you in my life." Too bad you won't have me in your life much longer. I realize too late that I just thought aloud when I look at Catnip's despondent expression. She quietly whispers, "Stop thinking that way. You're gonna make it."

"Catnip. At this point, we have to be real. We both know that I'm not gonna make it, unless we get some kind of miracle."

"Well then we'll just have to make one."

 _Attention tributes. Attention. Tomorrow at dawn, we, being the generous hosts that we are, will hold a feast at the Cornucopia._

Feasts. Yeah fucking right. These are just ploys to get the tributes back together to try and get the games to get more exciting for a moment. It's to create another bloodbath between the remaining tributes. Too bad neither me nor Katniss will fall into their trap. We don't need a stale loaf of bread to keep either of us alive.

 _Some of you may wish to decline our invitation. But this is no ordinary feast. This is a very special occasion. Each of you needs something desperately. For some of you, this will be your last chance._

Katniss immediately looks at me, and I know what she wants to do. I know it because it's what I would do. I need medicine to treat whatever's happening to me, which I'm gambling is blood poisoning.

"Catnip, no," I say weakly

"I don't have a choice, Gale. I already told you, I'm not letting you die."

"And I'm not letting you fall into that death trap." I grab her with a surprising amount of force considering my current state of weakness. "I won't let you go."

"You can't stop me, and I'm not gonna let the father of my baby die!"

I desperately yell, "If you go and you die, so will I, and so will our kid! If you don't then you and our baby definitely can and will make it."

She doesn't respond, but I know that she's not having it with me fighting against her. She turns her head away. "Gale. You know that I'm going to go anyways. You can't stop me, and you can barely move. You won't last much longer. You need the medicine, and no matter what you say, I'm going to get it."

I know that I can't stop her, but I could never live with myself if I didn't make some attempt at stopping her. "I know I can't stop you. But will you at least take some of my knives?"

She looks down at the pile of sickly flesh that is me, and she bends down at takes a couple of sharp, but easily concealable knives.

"Thank you, Catnip." I make one last desperate plea, "Please don't go. Please, choose yourself. For our kid."

She doesn't say anything else, she simply turns away from me and droops her head down for a few moments. She says, "I could never live with myself knowing that I simply let you die. And I could never look this baby, our baby, in the eyes, and tell him or her one die that their father died because I didn't take the chance to save his life. I will never just stand by and let you die. You know that. So stop trying to stop me."

I finally concede. "Okay." She comes back to me, and cuddles me again. And I hold her close to me.

"I love you Gale."

"I love you Catnip."

The loud ringing noise of a sponsor gift parachute rings out through the cave. Katniss immediately perches up, and goes outside to find it. She comes back in holding a small unopened case.

"What gift could help us now?" I say sarcastically.

Katniss opens it and shows off a metal syringe filled with a dark green liquid, and an elastic band. The note reads:

 _Congratulations on the baby. Stay alive. This will keep him alive until the morning. H._

Catnip looks up and repeatedly thanks Haymitch from afar. I offer her my injured left arm. It's the first time I get to see how bad I really look. My skin is all slightly discolored with the veins almost black in appearance. I'm surprised I have feeling and can even move it. It looks like my arm is just rotting away. I can imagine that this probably reaches into my torso as well. Katniss wraps my arm with the band to bulge the veins and gives me an injection. It takes a few moments for the liquid to fully drain from the syringe into my body, but I can already see some revitalizing effects on me, the veins start losing their discoloration all throughout my arm. It's slow, but I imagine it's a good sign. I hope I don't lose it if I make it out of here.

Katniss takes the band off, and says, "See. I told you not to give up. You're gonna be okay."

I look up and start thanking Haymitch, much as Katniss did earlier. Maybe it is worthwhile to hope for the best.

* * *

 _Song credit: Demons by Imagine Dragons_


	22. Warm Your Body

**A/N: Thank you to everyone who has stuck by this story. I took a break to focus on other stories, other fanfics, and school. That also means that I'm well into the second part of this story. The next update won't take as long.**

* * *

 **Warm Your Body**

I shoot awake. I don't know why, my sleep was dreamless and my face isn't looking towards the light. Wait, where's Catnip? Did she sneak off while I was sleeping? Oh God. That injection must have been some kind of sedative to make sure that I didn't try to stop her one last time. Why would Haymitch send that? I already know the answer to that. Haymitch made sure I wouldn't succeed in convincing her to stay.

Though, I can't really blame him for that. She would've gone anyways. I just hope that she's okay. If anything happens to her...and my kid, I could never forgive myself. I'm supposed to keep her safe, I'm supposed to protect her. That's what a man is supposed to do, watch over them. But there's nothing I can do now. The only thing I can do is wait. Wait for cannons to sound or not, wait for her to come back or not. At least fate has already ensured that I'll die if she does with this wound infection.

On the bright side, my body doesn't feel like it's on fire anymore. The injection wasn't a sedative cure, but it certainly did its job in a abating my infection. My arm doesn't look nearly as necrotic as before. Maybe that's why they gave me that syringe. I may not have made it through the night otherwise. I stand up, but I still feel weaker than ever. Maybe because of hunger, maybe because of the infection, maybe because of both. Regardless, I can't just sit around.

I hear a parachute chime echoing through the cave. It's only then that I see it's silhouette right there at the entrance. How the hell did those people know I would wake up right now? Or did they wait and then send it in? I guess it doesn't matter. I manage to muster enough strength to climb up through the tunnel. I open up the case to find a closed box within it, and a note.

 _This was supposed to be for Rue. Thank you for watching over her. Don't blame yourself. 11._

I don't believe it. Pressure builds up behind my eyes. This has never happened before, that I know of. Districts give gifts to their tributes all the time. But they never give a gift to the tribute of another district. I want to open it, but I don't dare. I want Katniss here. She deserves this gift as much as I do. We both watched over her, we both had to feel her die.

The next thing I hear are footsteps. Running footsteps. Katniss. She's back. My heart drops to my knees in pure relief.

She quickly asks me, "What are doing?"

"I wasn't leaving. I found this parachute up here."

"We can deal with that later. I have it. The medicine. Come on, get back down there."

I manage to scurry back down, still holding the box from 11. At the bottom, I use one hand to unzip my jacket, which is all that I have on my top.

I finally notice the cut over the left side of her face. "Anything I should know about from the feast?"

She gets down and starts ruffling through the bag, which has a noticeable number 12 on it. "The girl from 2. She threw a knife at me. I'm fine. We're fine."

I told her something like that was gonna happen. "No you're not Catnip."

"Gale! I'm okay. Believe me. She's dead. And she never stabbed me, or even hit me. She didn't get the chance too. You can thank Thresh for that."

"Thresh?"

"Now's not the time Gale." She pulls out a cylindrical metal container that seems to contain some kind of skin-colored cream. She quickly takes the bandage over my shoulder off and doesn't hesitate to start rubbing it in my wound. It hurts like hell, but it's bearable. She doesn't stop until my wound is fully covered with the cream and then some.

"Okay. Your turn."

She seems a little annoyed. "Gale I'm fine."

I ignore her, and grab the container and take some of the cream and start rubbing the cream across her cut on her head. She doesn't resist physically when I do. I guess she's just humoring me, but I'm grateful for it.

We both take a moment of silence, until I break it, saying, "What happened down there, Catnip?"

She takes a breath before explaining.

"I stalked around the Cornucopia and didn't see anything or anybody nearby. I was about to make my move right when Foxface emerged from the structure and took her bag. Right afterwards, I ran towards it and grabbed our bag, before running around the Cornucopia, where Clove ambushed me. Clove dodged my arrows, and then tackled me to the ground. I put up a fight, but she pinned my arms down and held a knife to my throat."

She stops for a moment. "Katniss. I told you something like that could've happened! Hell, it's what I said would happen!"

Catnip doesn't respond to my outburst, and simply continues. "She started taunting me about you. And about Rue. How I couldn't help her, and how now I couldn't help you."

One tear after another slides down my cheek, knowing that the girl I love, and our kid, were nearly killed by a 15-year-old psychopath. "That was why I didn't want you to go. The only reason I stopped arguing was cause I knew I couldn't change your mind. I guess Haymitch knew that and gave me a sedative medicine to make sure I wouldn't try one last time when we woke up."

She looks at me with a guilt-ridden face. She doesn't say anything related to what I said. She keeps going. "She was about to start cutting up my face, starting with my lips. She said I wouldn't need them anymore since I couldn't kiss you anymore. I thought that I was dead, that you were right, and that I had just condemned myself, you," She places a hand over her stomach, "and our baby to death." She quietly cries, too.

"Thresh saved you?"

She nods. "He pulled Clove off of me. He held her by the neck against the Cornucopia. He apparently heard what she said about Rue and thought she was the one that killed her. She denied it, truthfully. But he didn't believe her, and he smashed her against the Cornucopia multiple times. Until we both saw blood splatter onto it. He looked at me menacingly and I thought he was gonna take the chance to kill me. But he looked at me and said, 'Just this time 12. For Rue.' And then he ran off."

"Seems like District 11 has made a habit out of helping District 12 this year." I take the chance to show her the box I found in the parachute. It still had the note attached. She quickly sees what the note says, and sheds a salty tear. She holds her face in her hand crying. I sit up and try to embrace her with just my right arm.

When she gathers herself a bit, she opens the box, revealing a loaf of bread. Fate must have some pretty twisted and convoluted plans for us. This feels almost exactly like the last few moments we spent before the reaping. Sitting outside the fence with a loaf of bread I got from the Mellarks. Maybe we should've run away that day. Taken our families and just went. But it's too late for that now.

Katniss takes out the loaf originally intended to feed 12-year-old Rue, and slowly tears it in two. She gives one piece to me. It feels warm, fresh. I feel guilty when I start eating it because I'm eating food that I feel I didn't deserve. What did we do to deserve this bread? We failed to protect her, we failed to protect Rue. Katniss clearly feels the same way. We reluctantly take our first bite. And then primal hunger overtakes us and we scarf down the rest of our pieces quickly. I'm grateful for this gift, but I feel like I don't deserve it. I'm certain that Catnip feels the same way.

With our stomachs practically empty, and both of us hungry, a loaf of bread is quite the meal.

Katniss speaks first. "I honestly... I don't feel good having eaten her bread."

"Nor I." I pause, and say, "What did we do to deserve this?"

Katniss just shakes her head. We both know what the people of District 11 would say. We know that they would say that it's a thank you for taking care of Rue. Ironically, that's the reason we feel so guilty.

I say, "It's my fault she's gone."

"No Gale. It's not yours. It's mine. If I had come back to the camp when I was supposed to, she wouldn't have been alone out there."

"But you didn't. With good reason. An explosion does a lot to you. You resting probably kept our kid alive. Regardless. I was alone with her, and I failed. I let her go."

"Gale. You didn't let her go. We both know that she would've gone looking for anything to help either of us. That's who she was."

"We had her. We got her out of that trap. And we were both between her and Marvel. And we failed to protect her," I tearfully say, looking at the charm she gave me.

Katniss starts crying too. She then whispers, "You were too weak from that wound to do anything. I was the one who was supposed to protect her, and I failed."

The last thing I say, letting tears fall down my cheeks, is, "We both failed her."

Katniss cups my face in her hands and kisses me deeply. I kiss her back equally forcefully, our emotions are too far gone for it to really mean anything for us.

"If... _when_...we make it out of here. I want to give our baby Rue's name as his middle name, or if it's a girl, her first name."

The very suggestion warms up my heart. To name our little baby after the girl who left this world too soon, and had such an impact on our lives, I could never say no. I nod my head in agreement. I move my right hand under her shirt and feel her. I feel her belly, where she carries my child. Our child. But a part of me feels apprehensive. Because to me, the name will always remind me...that I can't protect a kid. I don't know if I could look into his or her eyes and be constantly reminded of my failure to protect the very girl for whom they are named. I want to say it, but I can't bring myself to say something of that nature right now.

* * *

I didn't even realize that I fell asleep until I woke up from my dreamless sleep. The light coming in is dimmer, and orange in color. I feel far better than ever. I don't feel like the temperature outside is pulsing violently, and my head isn't throbbing. I start stirring, which apparently wakes up Catnip too. She looks right up at me. The first thing I see is that her cut is gone, it's just a scar.

I trace it and say, "Oh my God. Your head. You're so much better"

Katniss apparently feels that it's gone too. She immediately glances towards my shoulder and her jaw drops. A smile creeps across her face just the same. She touches the spot on my shoulder where the stab wound was. I feel hardly anything.

"Gale. Oh my."

We both look at each other in shock and awe, and happiness. We have a chance to make it, we have a chance to make it out of here alive, together. Me, Catnip, and our kid.

For the first time in a long time, we have hope. We can make it. Both of us. All three of us.

* * *

 _Song credit: Crying in the Club by Camila Cabello_


End file.
